You could really make a case that Chris

Rufo is the most successful activist

certainly on the right of this era. He

initially rose in prominence as the

central strategist in the rights

counterattack on DEI initiatives. He's

very much behind a lot of the

demonization of critical race theory.

>> Critical race theory has become in

essence the default ideology of the

federal bureaucracy and is now being

weaponized against the American people.

He claims CRT is actually a

revolutionary program that would

overturn the principles of the

declaration and destroy the remaining

structure of the constitution

>> and he built that into a series of

campaigns. They've actually changed

policy. It's very influential in Ronda

Santis' governorhip and kind of running

Claudine Gay out of Harvard. Pushing out

Claudine Gay, toppling the president of

Harvard for a journalist like me is a

big win. Then in Donald Trump's second

term, quite a lot has come out of Rufo's

work. For better and from my

perspective, for worse, from a lot of

Trump's early executive orders,

>> we've ended the tyranny of so-called

diversity, equity, and inclusion

policies all across the entire federal

government and indeed the private sector

and our military

>> to some of the work that led to the ICE

and CBP deployments to Minnesota. This

week, I published an exclusive story

exposing the Somali fraud rings in

Minneapolis, Minnesota, which are

stealing billions of dollars from

American taxpayers. Whatever else you

want to say about him, Rufo has quite

significantly affected the world we live

in. He's also, if you listen to him, and

he's a very, very smart and often quite

honest analyst of his own side. One

thing I appreciate about Rufo is he

always says what he is doing clearly and

in public. He seems uneasy. Gone are the

days when Tucker Carlson's nightly

monologue set the agenda for the entire

right. You can feel a sort of disqu, a

sense that maybe the right, this right,

is not becoming what he hoped it would

be. Now we find ourselves in an

escalating war of influencers trading

conspiracies and counterconspiracies

that its attentional andformational

sphere is polluted. Driving the right

into all different kinds of rabbit holes

and dead ends that the administration is

not getting as much done as he had hoped

intended

tried to help it do. And so I wanted to

have Rufo on not because we agree on

things. We obviously don't. You'll hear

that. Not because I'm trying to talk him

into my way of seeing things. I'm not

going to do that. But both to understand

how he understands what he is doing and

also to interrogate it. To ask if the

tactics he is using are actually working

or if he's scoring short-term victories

at the cost of helping to seed profound

long-term problems. Rufo is a senior

fellow and director of the initiative on

critical race theory at the Manhattan

Institute. He's a contributing editor of

City Journal. He is the co-host of the

podcast Rufo and Lomez. And he's the

author of America's Cultural Revolution:

How the Radical Left Conquered

Everything. As always, my email, Ezra

Kleinshow Times.com.

Chris Rufo, welcome to the show. Good to

be with you. So, I want to begin with a

piece you wrote in early 2024 titled The

New Right Activism, a manifesto for the

counterrevolution.

And there are a lot of interesting

things in there, but the one I wanted to

begin with is you write no institution

can be neutral. So, tell me why. Yeah, I

mean that that's a an obvious reality if

you think about it for longer than a

minute. And I think it it's important to

say because there's this mythology that

we have in the United States and it's a

small Liberal mythology that

institutions can be kind of neutral

orbiters that they could be uh valueless

vessels

um that achieve some kind of pragmatic

or instrumental ends. And my point is

that no in practice institutions always

have values whether they're implicit uh

or explicit. Uh and for those of us who

are on the outside of many powerful

institutions, it's there's a lot of

value in simply revealing the underlying

reality. And in fact, political fights

are at heart the fight for who

determines the values, what values are

are are installed in an institution. Um

and then therefore what kind of

decisions get made.

>> So I take a lot of the arguments about

institutions particularly within like

the broad philosophical tradition of

liberalism argue that they can have

neutral treatment. They can have neutral

rules and a lot of for better and worse

procedure in these institutions.

Everything from notice and comment

periods to different ways that they have

to create transparency are about trying

to create that capacity for people to be

neutrally treated. Do you think that's

possible?

>> No. I I think neutral is the wrong word.

I think what we're looking for is

impartial. And I would agree with that.

Everyone should be treated equally as an

individual under law, but that's

impartiality, not neutrality. So in a

criminal case, um if you sentence

somebody to the death penalty, you're

not treating them neutally. You're

actually taking their life because the

underlying law is a kind of moral code.

Uh and so I I think neutral and

impartial are similar but in this case

uh kind of critically different. So

another argument you make in that piece

is you say the popular slogan that facts

don't care about your feelings betrays

similar problems. slogan being Ben

Shapiro's slogan. In reality, feelings

almost always overpower facts. Reason is

a slave of the passions.

>> Yeah, that that's true. And uh we we'll

caveat. We love Ben Shapiro. We're we're

Ben Shapiro fans, of course. Um but I

think that that he's he's very wrong on

that. And I think conservatives have

made a fundamental error in latching on

to that. And really what it is, it's

it's a rationalization for uh losing.

It's like uh yes we may have lost the

great political question which operates

on emotions or passions um but you know

we have the facts on our side and if

only people would read our you know

white paper our kind of regression

analysis our rigorous logical

argumentation

uh then we would be we would be

vindicated. Um but look while we should

have the facts on our side while we

should use logic by itself it's

insufficient and in fact politics

operates on a deeper level an emotional

level and politics occurs on the on the

field of sentiment and public opinion

much more on the field of you know uh

kind of abstract argumentation at the

top.

>> So and then you go on in the same piece

to make an argument for agaprop. So

aprop old Soviet Union term for

agitation and propaganda. Yeah. Mashed

up together.

>> And it doesn't have a great reputation.

Agyprop is usually not a term of

endearment. But you say agyprop doesn't

mean sacrificing the truth, but rather

channeling the truth toward victory. So

how do you define what agit prop is? And

and what are you trying to explain to

your fellow conservatives about how to

use it? So, right, I mean, if you're

obviously if you're conducting say

propaganda on behalf of a falsehood or

evil or an unjust cause, it's bad. My

point is that that's not always

necessarily true. If you are pursuing a

cause that is good and true and

beautiful. If you look at the word

propaganda, um the original meaning it

comes from the Catholic Church. Uh and

it was the propagation of the the

gospels, the propagation of the the

truth. And so these are concepts that we

can recover because the reality is that

all politics and the age of the printing

press and onward depends on propaganda.

And how do you define what propaganda

itself is? Propaganda is is is simply

the the method of uh communicating a

political narrative. Again, we're using

neutral, I'm going to say a true

narrative um uh to a mass audience

through the means of modern media. It's

a rhetorical argument

intended to persuade the majority of

people to cobble together a majority of

public opinion. And look, this is again

for conservatives especially not new. Uh

you know the the founding fathers of

this country wrote to each other about

this. They wrote in public about this.

Um we seem to have forgotten some of

these lessons uh of how politics

actually works. You have to persuade

people. What is persuasion? It's

rhetoric. What is rhetoric at an

industrial scale? It's propaganda.

>> You've been connecting the question of

propaganda to whether or not the end it

is aimed at is true. How do you think

about when you have untrue propaganda

unleashing intense passions that's bad

>> towards a true aim?

>> Yeah. Look, I I don't think that that's

good. I I think that um

Aristotle has a great line in his book

on rhetoric where he says the truth has

a tendency to prevail. I love that. I

love that because it's like

>> the truth doesn't always prevail. We can

look through history. We can look at

history uh you know

>> and sometimes lies prevail.

>> Uh I think in 2020 uh to 2024 during the

woke era many lies prevailed. But what

is so interesting about that line is the

truth has a tendency to prevail. What I

take from it is that therefore you

always want to be on the side of the

truth. Even for your own pragmatic

political ends you always want to be on

the side of the truth. And so look,

certainly there are untrue elements uh

or narratives on the right and on the

left. I I I think a political movement

to succeed has to have the discipline

and integrity um to to go after it um

but always to remember that if the truth

has a tendency to prevail, that's where

you want to be. And then your piece

builds to this idea that quote in order

to realize the ultimate promise of the

political, there also must be something

higher, a tilos, which is the Greek word

for something like an ultimate end,

>> a final cause.

>> A final clause.

>> So one reason I've been focusing on this

piece is to understand the way you do

your work and what your work is. So what

is your tilos?

>> Well,

politically speaking, let's say, let's

leave it at that.

>> Yeah. I don't mean your family and

>> Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I I think I want to

have a restoration of the principles of

our republic. And so, if you're thinking

about our republic, you're thinking

about those guiding principles where

they have strayed over the last 250

years. Um, uh, I want to have a

restoration of that. And so, I I'm

constantly looking backward at the

founding and trying to understand it

better and understand how to bring those

principles forward. And so, you want to

have the principles of liberty and

equality. You want to have a a

functioning healthy republic. Uh and you

want to have a culture that is organized

according to virtue. Um and in

particular, you know, the virtues of our

western Anglo-American civilization.

And through my personal observations

around the world as well as my study of

the past, I think the Anglo-American

civilization, the principles that have

animated our republic for the last 250

years are still uh the best that we

could hope for. So from that

perspective, we're 17 months into Donald

Trump's second term. Is is that all

>> it feels like longer.

>> Tell me about it.

>> It feels like longer for you guys

probably.

>> Is this administration building the kind

of country you want to see?

>> Yeah, I think so. And here's how I would

here's how I would assess it

on the elements within article 2. So the

executive power I think Donald Trump has

done almost everything he could do.

great people with the administration

have done almost everything they could

do uh to advance this kind of vision of

the country. Um and

>> liberty, equality, virtue.

>> Yes. And uh and I think that the

momentum was strong year one. I think

it's trailed off in year two. And you

know, could that be the executive has

lost some of its energy? Yes. Uh could

it be that you know, public opinion has

has has has softened? Yes. Could it be

some of the foreign adventures or

misadventures depending on who you talk

to have distracted focus? I think yes.

But ultimately the problem is that the

president has a majority in Congress but

not 60 votes in the Senate. And so

fundamental transformative legislation

that I would like to see is impossible.

>> Make the case to me that Donald Trump is

restoring virtue.

This is a hard case because what you're

going to say is that Trump does not

exhibit the kind of Christian virtues in

his personal life, right? Uh I

>> I'm not even thinking about his personal

life. I'm thinking about his public

life.

>> Okay. Well, you you you tell me. Uh uh

>> I I didn't claim he exhibits virtue. So

you you said you said that they are

doing a pretty good job bringing back uh

liberty, equality, and virtue.

>> Correct.

>> Make the case to me.

>> Sure. I'll make you the case and I'll

I'll I'll make it through the the

particular example that I'm most

familiar with. So, one of my big

campaigns the last couple years was the

fight to abolish DEI.

And so, DEI was this idea that had been

kind of germinating in the in the in in

the '9s, in the 2000s, but really

exploded into public life with universal

adoption by most large institutions

after 2020. And it was this idea that

was very simple um that there are

oppressor groups and oppressed groups in

the United States because of the

historical realities of our country. And

therefore to achieve uh to to move

towards equal outcomes, you have to

treat individuals uh unequally according

to their group identity. And the

president on day one uh issued an

executive order that was very much in

line with the work that we have been

doing um to to go and kind of wipe out

the DEI bureaucracy throughout the

federal government. And so in that case,

I think that you could argue that the

principle of equality and impartiality

as we were discussing earlier um had

been restored. Not not totally. We still

have some problems with the underlying

statutory law. Uh just recently in the

in the last couple of weeks, the

Department of Justice has taken a

buzzsaw to so-called disperate impact

doctrine. Same idea. If there are

unequal outcomes, it must therefore by

definition be because of discrimination.

Therefore, you have to remedy it by

treating people unequally. And so in

this case, I think, you know, and

because this is the issue I've worked on

and uh and have been passionate about, I

think that you can make an argument that

liberty, equality, virtue uh have been

restored. Are there other problems? Of

course. Are we all the way there? No.

Um, but on the issues that I personally

care about, that I personally have

worked on, uh, I think the country is in

a much better place than it was, uh, two

years ago.

>> I guess one thing I think about when I

think about Donald Trump and virtue is

corruption. So I see Trump taking

uh, luxury aircraft from cutter. I see

his family getting involved in all kinds

of crypto schemes where the investors in

their crypto schemes in many cases seem

to be people who have business before

the family, business before the country.

Uh the New Yorker sort of did a I think

a quite conservative tallying up of how

much money the Trump family and Trump

have made or how much their net worth

has increased that has been connected to

the presidency. The number was about $4

billion in this term.

It doesn't when I look at it look

virtuous.

>> Yeah. Look, um here's here's my general

perspective and and I'll lay it out to

you as honestly as I can. Um there are

the issues that I work on that I'm

passionate about that I feel like I have

some control over or influence over and

there are the issues that I don't. And I

think I've been very straightforward in

the areas where I think the

administration has fallen short. And

certainly the perception and we'll see

over time I'm sure that there will be uh

you know inquiries, investigations, etc.

into these business enterprises um is

bad. You're not going to get me to

defend it. I'm perfectly happy calling

out uh the administration where I think

it's strayed or aired. Um and this is

one of those places. I mean I remember

the the crypto launch. It was during the

transition I think where they launched

the Trumpcoin, right? And it's like, I

don't like this. I don't want to see

this. They shouldn't be doing that. Um,

and yeah, you're not going to get me to

defend it.

>> Well, one of the things I'm I'm touching

into here is I've been watching your

show and I see a growing vein of

discomfort from you on at least what

parts of the right are becoming.

>> Sure. So in December he tweeted, "The

right's media apparatus is how the right

teaches its followers how to think, and

it's currently getting consumed by

conspiracy, psychodrama, and tabloid

conflicts. If left unchecked, it will

turn the audience into the equivalent of

a third world click farm. So what's Tell

me about that. What's been alarming

you?" Yeah. Yeah. That Yeah. Sometimes,

man, you hear your quotes back, you're

like, "Oh, that's kind of uh Yeah. Very

very very lively language." Yeah. This

is a huge problem. And um I don't Okay,

so I I'll put it this way. There's a

growing split between the institutional

right and the online right. The

institutional right I think actually

deserves credit for gatekeeping some of

these um kind of bad tendencies out of

our institutions and uh and I think

that's good. However, the online

>> right being like Fox News and

>> yes,

>> conservative think tanks, uh, you know,

the Manhattan Institute, all all of the

kind of the institutional layer of the

professional right, let's say, I think

has done a very good job at gatekeeping

some of these bad psychological and

political tendencies out of our

institutions.

The problem that we're grappling with

though is that the traditional way of

thinking about political media is always

as an outgrowth of institutions. So

you'd have your uh your magazines, your

newsletters, your think tank, you know,

policy papers. The internet has created,

you know, kind of benefits, costs and

benefits. One of the benefits is the

kind of ease of communication with a

large audience. But one of the negatives

is that um you have the proliferation of

insanity, madness, uh psychopathology.

And on the right, I think this went into

hyperdrive after the assassination of

Charlie Kirk was bubbling up before

then, but really then took a turn. And

so you have this tendency on the right

historically.

You have like a a kind of bircher

tendency uh in the post-war era and then

it kind of waxes and waines over time.

And right now you have um in the online

right someone like Candace Owens who has

like departed so far from reality and

yet has a massive audience. Um, and I

think that it's doing a disservice to

the public and even more say kind of

self-interestedly doing a very grave

disservice to the right because if you

can't teach the your audience, your

followers, your political base how to

think properly, they're not going to

behave properly and you're not going to

have proper outcomes. And so I think

it's important for us on the right to

have this internal fight, which is to

say if you think that, you know, Israel

assassinated Charlie Kirk or, you know,

whatever kind of handful of conspiracies

you have, you know, you're you're you're

on the outside. You're not within the

movement. And uh and this is a fight

that is happening now. And I think uh

given sufficient amount of time, I think

we'll win.

>> Why do you think you'll win? Because I

look at at the right and I see Tucker

Carlson and his current guys, which is a

much more conspiratorial guys than he's

had before, uh has become more and more

dominant figure. As you note, Candace

Owen success has been startling.

Uh I guess I'd ask this question in two

two dimensions. What is the audience

demand that they are meeting? Right?

What what what is it that they are

providing that people want? And then I

guess the second question is why do you

think you'll win?

>> Yeah, great question. So, first of all,

the audience for conspiracy theories is

enormous. Um, before his kind of legal

uh troubles, someone like Alex Jones was

making apparently millions of dollars

selling vitamins and survival supplies

and and uh if you think about it, to

generate that kind of revenue requires a

massive, if kind of quiet, under the

surface audience. And so I I I think

they're really tapping into that side of

the audience. It's right-wing, but not

exclusively right-wing. And in fact, a

lot of the people who have come over to

these conspiracy theories are in that

part of the horseshoe where their

politics are, you know, um let's say sub

ideological. They're more of a a

feeling, a perception, um a a set of

resentments. Second, how do conspiracy

theories work? Conspiracy theories work

um for people who want to forfeit

agency, for people who do not see the

possibility of constructive action in

their personal lives or in public life.

And therefore, the conspiracy theory

gives them the rationalization and

justification for their nihilism.

It's, you know, insert here, right? It's

this group, it's that group, it's it's

this other group that is that is

controlling the world, making everything

impossible, assassinating our our our

heroes. And this gives them a

psychological key, right? That is

self-reinforcing because a conspiracy

theory for conspiracy theorists can

never be debunked, right? It's just one

layer of the onion that gets peeled. And

I'll tell you why I think we're going to

win because I've noticed this um even

for people, let's say, um in my kind of

one degree of separation, conspiracy

theories, and I think in particular

anti-semitic conspiracy theories

eventually fry your brain. And so I

think that we'll see a lot of these

personalities, a lot of these

psychological tendencies kind of burn

out on their own. Um, and on top of that

as a kind of extra layer of

>> an optimistic view on the history of

anti-semitism right there.

>> Yeah. Well, okay, I'm saying in in the

near term these things kind of wax and

wayne, but I think what I've seen in the

United States is a greater set of

antibodies than you might find

elsewhere. And then institutionally for

our side on the right, um I I I think

that look, the people who run

institutions are aware of the problem.

They're confronting the problem. We're

dealing with it. And to me, this is

inevitable. Political coalitions are

going to have some kind of mixture of of

the good and the bad. And the question

is who's in a position of leadership?

What kind of courage and integrity they

have and can they succeed? And so I I I

think that when I look at the field uh

as it is, I think the I think this say

faction is less powerful than it was 6

months ago, a year ago and I hope that

trend continues. I think there's an

interesting question on institutions in

the right here. You I forget if it's a

Chesterton quote or a CS Lewis quote,

but he says one of them says that when

men stop believing in God, they don't

believe in nothing. when men stop

believing in God, they believe in

everything. And I do think there's a

dimension of that around institutions

where the right has become much more

anti-institutional. I think the view

that institutions cannot be neutral and

largely cannot even be impartial is much

more widely held and there's been a sort

of coordinated attack on many of the

institutions in American life. But but

sort of new ones haven't emerged, right?

You could imagine the right and the left

having parallel institutions that have

different core values because I do agree

with you actually that institutions

almost they do always have values at

their heart and when you don't think

they do it just means you don't know

what they are

>> correct

>> um but I think a lot

>> or they're being deliberately obscured

right but I think sometimes about I

think Tucker Carlson is an interesting

figure here somebody who came up

institutionally I think sometimes about

this speech he gave at the 2009

conservative political action conference

>> and I saw conservatives create many of

their own media organizations and I saw

many of those organizations prosper and

I saw some of them fail and here's the

difference. The ones that failed refused

to put accuracy first. This is the hard

truth and conservatives need to deal

with this. I I believe this. I'm as

conservative as any person in this room.

I am literally in the process of

stockpiling weapons and food and moving

to Idaho. So I'm not in any way going to

take a second seat to anybody in this

room ideologically. But I will say

honestly, if you create a news

organization whose primary objective is

not to deliver accurate news, you will

fail. You will fail. The New York Times

is a liberal paper, but it's also, and

it is to its core a liberal paper. It's

also a paper that cares about whether

they spell people's names right. By and

large, it's a paper that actually cares

about accuracy. Conservatives need to

build institutions that mirror those

institutions that are that's the truth.

You don't believe me?

So, put aside put put aside the the

special pleading from the New York Times

here.

>> Carlson tried to build his own media

institution, the Daily Caller. Sure.

>> Um, I would say it did not, my

impression of it is that it did not

become a place to put accuracy first and

became a kind of conservative New York

Times.

>> It did not become a conservative.

>> It did not become a conservative New

York Times. uh over time he went in I

think darker and darker directions uh as

he chased the audience and now he's

fully without institution

and has I think emerged I'll put it this

way into a form I think when I listen to

you you find more concerning and

problematic. So what do you think went

wrong there?

>> Yeah. Well it look this is a a long-term

trend. This didn't emerge in 2009 or or

2020. I think of it this way. Um, the

left is over institutionalized and the

right is under institutionalized.

>> I say this all the time, man. Left is

over formed by institutions. The right

is underformed.

>> Correct. And so we have kind of opposite

uh opposite problems. And I think of it

also in in this way. I wrote a piece

about this I don't know a long time ago

and I think it really it really holds

up. The left is organized as a capital P

party and the right is organized under a

capital P prince. So you have Donald

Trump essentially sets the direction of

the right for better for worse um

through personal charismatic power and

his relationship with the conservative

base. There's really no mediating

institutions uh in the kind of way that

you would see elsewhere. That's where

conservatives have figured out this

formula for at least the time being to

achieve political victory. It has

benefits. It has it has problems. The

left has the opposite problem. Um, the

reason why I think you get like

presidential candidates on the left that

seem to be like devoid of traditional

charisma is because it's organized uh as

an institutional apparatus or a capital

P party. And so conservatives have a

problem with institutions. Conservatives

have a problem building institutions.

And and this is the deepest irony,

right? is that conservatives in a

healthy republic would be the ones that

are um preserving the institutions um

restoring the institutions, maintaining

the institutions. But conservatives have

found themselves on the outside of

institutions. And so when we're talking

about this concept of counterrevolution,

it's a paradox, right? Because a

counterrevolution is not necessarily

um a conservative impulse on the top.

You can have a conservative mission or

goal that drives it. That's why it's a

counterrevolution rather than a

revolution. Um, but conservatives are in

this really interesting position where

you have a lot of people on the

intellectual right. They attend the

black tai gallas. They attend the events

at the country club. They eat the, you

know, salmon dinner at the whatever

Hilton, you know, ballroom.

And I'm always looking around at these.

I I you know don't like these events cuz

I'm always looking around and saying you

guys are out of your minds. You guys are

operating as if um you know the Elks

lodge was still the formative

institution of the United States. You're

living in a fantasy. You're living in a

nostalgia that isn't actually grappling

with the fundamental problems in the

country and is totally out of step with

the very voters that you claim to

represent. And so look, this is a this

is a problem. I I I don't I can't say

that there's a snap your finger

solution. Um and so you have to start

where you start. You know, I work for an

institution that I think is, you know,

the best in in in the business, the

Manhattan Institute. I think we do good

work that has a high degree of accuracy

and rigor and intelligence. Uh and I

think that we've put up uh practical

political victories uh in a way that few

others have. Another version of this is

uh a line I like is that the personality

type of the left is bureaucratic and the

personality type of the right is

autocratic.

And I don't think that was always true.

You let me give you a response.

>> Well, I don't think so.

>> I think in the Trump era it is.

>> Okay. Well, it make the case. Make the

case.

>> There is a falling in line behind Donald

Trump. So, here is my view of the two

coalitions right now. The genius of

Donald Trump in the 2024 election was he

collapsed the multi-dimensional test of

party loyalty that existed in the

previous Republican party. Were you

pro-life? Did you believe in low taxes?

You know, what was your foreign policy?

Etc. And certainly the multi-dimensional

agenda test you see on the left down to

a single point of loyalty. Did you

support him personally?

If you did, there was actually room for

a wide variety of other opinions. You

could be a technofuturist.

>> You could be a Christian traditionalist.

You could be RFK Jr. who'd been running

as a Democrat just a year or two before.

Um, but also you could be Ted Cruz. And

what held that together is that the line

that you could not cross was Trump

himself. But as long as you were useful

to him, you could be on the team. Now

that has obvious issues when you move

into governance and I think some of them

have have emerged but it gave him and

them a freedom of movement across other

issues where you know a comma Harris a

Tim Walls uh Joe Biden were much more

boxchecking right this sort of

multi-dimensional loyalty test that the

left uses and so on the left you end up

with uh and I mean here the left not

like the democratic social stuff but the

left coalition in this country, the

broad democratic party,

>> you end up with people who have sort of

all of the right views

>> and have an institutional personality,

right? Are somewhat riskaverse, are

worried about getting in trouble at a

meeting. And on the right, you have

people who

>> they'll go crazy in a meeting. You can

be Bill Py, but as long as the boss

likes you, you're safe. Okay. Yeah. I I

think that there are elements of that

that are true. prince versus party. It's

a method of political organization,

psychological organization. Certainly,

one of Trump's kind of the great litmus

test for him is personal loyalty. Like

we we've seen that you're with Trump,

he's he's with you, you're you're you

cross him um and he'll he'll he'll

attack you.

>> You could be Kim Jong-un and be

>> buddy. It was like a nice buddy comedy.

I feel like there'd be a buddy comedy.

>> He likes Kim Jong-un more than he likes

Mark Carney.

>> Yeah. Well, you know, um, fair fair

enough. And as personal chemistry goes,

uh, but yeah, I think there's some truth

to that, but I wouldn't therefore I

think your conclusion is is overdrawn. I

don't think you could say the right has

autocratic personalities. I mean, I deal

with conservatives all the time. I I

don't see that as a psychological

tendency, but the people I work with,

the people I talk to, my friends and

neighbors. Um, uh, but so yeah, I think

it's over overdrawn. on I think this is

just a question of political

organization uh from the top and I don't

think it's total just loyalty personal

loyalty I mean Trump wants uh

immigration restrictions strong national

borders build a wall he wants uh kind of

uh uh American national interestbased

foreign policy although that is kind of

uh a little bit on the outs and then he

represents uh or at least championed a

lot of the causes that that that that I

cared about care about um you know on

DEI I on higher education, on cultural

institutions,

um you know, and a and a whole host of

other sub issues that he really grabbed

on to. And and look, this is good. You

you you you kind of have to work with

what what is there. You want to you

always want to plan for the future,

build for the future, but ultimately

you're faced with decisions in the

moment. And uh look on the whole I think

in those areas uh where we have had more

freedom of movement more ability to to

execute policy I think things have been

going quite well.

>> I want to go back to Tucker. So uh I've

seen you talk about your take on his

evolution and something you said is that

the Tucker Carlson of the Fox News era

when he was given his 8mm monologues

that in that era they were a unifying

script for the right. that Fox News was

this institutional structure around him

that maybe contained him to a certain

point and that created a

unity a coherence

that has now dissolved not just around

him specifically but uh around the right

more broadly. Now, the liberal take on

Tucker uh in the Fox News era is that he

was beginning to bring a white national

strain into centrality in the Republican

party that, you know, there were all

these Daily Stormer articles about how

much uh he was saying exactly what they

thought. He was talking about great

replacement theory. And you've got to

ask yourself as you watch the historic

tragedy that is Joe Biden's immigration

policy. What's the point of this? They

are flooding this country with

immigrants in order to change the

demography to maintain political power

for themselves to change the racial mix

of the country. That's the reason to

reduce the political power of people

whose ancestors lived here and

dramatically increase the proportion of

Americans newly arrived from the third

world. Now I know that the left and all

the little gatekeepers on Twitter become

literally hysterical if you use the term

replacement, but they become hysterical

because that's that's what's happening

actually. Let's just say it. That's

true. He had already in our view become

quite conspiratorial and that what he is

now and what he is then are a straight

line from each other and that the the

sort of passions he was unleashing.

Right. Reason of course being a slave of

such passions that it was always going

to go in one direction and that

celebrating what he was at that moment

and then being confused by what he is at

this moment is a kind of like a like a

strange unwillingness to either grapple

with one or the other. So, tell me how

you see it.

>> Yeah, I I don't I don't see it that way.

I mean, when Tucker was on Fox at that

8:00 PM Eastern time, 5:00 PM uh Western

time for me, um it really did feel like

a shelling point for the right. It was

like a quarterback um calling the plays

every night at 8:00 in that first, you

know, 5 to 10 minutes where Tucker kind

of condensed the opinion, represented

the opinion, reflected back the opinion,

uh and then everyone had uh a central

point, a central coherent point to to

think about, to talk about, to to to

mobilize on and it was very effective.

So even in my own experience when I

first started reporting on critical race

theory in the institutions

went on Tucker gave a kind of opening

monologue with Tucker President Trump

was watching it got a call from the

White House the next morning hey the

president saw you on TV he wants to take

action on critical race theory come to

the White House let's get this thing

done and so that mechanism that even in

my personal experience the loop on that

was like less than 12 hours

>> very tight loop

in the White House.

>> And I think also what I've learned about

Fox News is that uh Fox News uh has and

this is to to to its great credit, Fox

News has a kind of disciplinary

function. And I think especially after

2020 has become even more cognizant of

okay, message discipline is important.

Uh moving the message forward is

important. Here's the kind of guard

rails for for the narrative. And this is

a function of of institutions, a

function of technology.

>> Yes. But what I'm talking about is what

the narrative itself is. I agree with

you that Tucker played this role when he

was on Fox News. But the thing that many

of us who I mean I knew Tucker before

many of us who had watched him for a

long time from uh good time libertarian,

>> but what what spec you you I can't

you're invoking like the daily it's like

I don't know anything about the Daily

Stormer beyond beyond.

>> He talked a bunch about great

replacement. I mean this has been exa

hold on this has been exhaustingly

documented. I mean there are biographies

of the guy. The times did a bunch of

work on this. The bringing in of a macro

narrative that there was a function I

would call it a cabal of elites

importing brown voters to replace you.

Um that you were being betrayed by

elites representing foreign interests

and foreign people to sort of alter the

culture of this country to their

benefit.

was something he hammered all the time.

>> Fox News is reporting tonight that the

administration awarded a $172 million

grant to a George Soros linked

organization which exists to quote help

young border crossers avoid deportation.

Now, why is some foreignb born

billionaire allowed to change our

country fundamentally? That's the big

question, right? A relentless focus on

crime from immigrants, a relentless

focus on George Soros. And so to me, I

see Tucker now and I see Tucker then.

And I agree the shackles are off a

little bit, but I see him calling the

same play. He's just had to turn up the

dial a little bit because he doesn't

have Fox News.

>> I don't I don't think that's right. And

I think it Let's take the

>> You're presenting it in a way that is

very charged. Um I I don't think quite

fair, but let's take the charge, but

let's take the but but the narrative

that you're that you're portraying. I I

don't think that that's exactly uh you

know, how I would put it. certainly, but

the underlying facts are either true or

not true. And in this case, um,

demographic ch mass demographic change

has been and is a reality in the United

States. And I think it's fair to talk

about that politically. We've been

talking about it politically for for 10

years. And you could do it in a way that

is exemplifies bigotry or

discrimination, of course, but you can

also do it in a way that isn't isn't an

expression of bigotry or discrimination.

Um, but in fact is just a basic

question. Um, a question that the that

people in the United States have been

asking since uh since the 1770s. Who are

we? What is an American? Um, and if we

are a sovereign nation, we have the not

just the right, but really the

obligation to determine these great

questions of who comes in, who doesn't

come in. And and so I I don't think that

it is it is right to say that someone

who is concerned about rapid and large

scale demographic change is is is kind

of a white nationalist. Um, that that

seems like a kind of the kind of

>> No, I'm saying that the reason I think

Tucker is a white nationalist is due to

all the white nationalism. Well, let me

ask let me let me ask a question. Let me

ask a question. No, no, because that

that I mean that is a huge charge. Um,

and and and I I just again like what is

the evidence of that? You could be

concerned can you be concerned about

mass demographic change without being

racist? I I think the answer is yes.

>> How do you define a white nationalist?

>> Well, you you make the charge. you

define it and and substantiate your your

point.

>> So I think that Tucker's view is that

the

>> take Tucker out of it just make an in

general argument of what of what you can

kind of layer in Tucker.

>> So I think that there is a

straightforward view in white

nationalism that there is such a thing

as a white race. That race is

fundamentally European came here and

founded this country. that race has

depending on the variant of white

nationalism we're talking about uh

genetic advantages or cultural

advantages and that that race deserves

to have should have dominance

particularly over this country there are

harder and softer versions of this right

in some versions Jews are included in

that white race

>> sure in some versions they're not

included in that white race in some

versions we are talking about something

I would describe primarily as a kind of

nationalism right the you know If you

have too much of a country not sharing a

common heritage, you lose solidarity. In

some cases, we're talking about

something much darker than that. Right.

There are people who just don't like the

way their community is changing. And

there's the KKK, right? Everything

exists on a spectrum. But but would you

say someone who is like, for example,

hesitant about rapid largecale

demographic change is just a kind of 1%

white nationalist. Yeah. because that

would be like the majority of the

country.

>> Yes. I don't think it is a problem or

unfair or even wrong to worry about

large scale rapid demographic change. So

to maybe to be more specific about

Tucker, so you just had on um the

right-wing writer Scott Greer. Um he's

got a book coming out on the online

right called White Pill. So Greer was a

former deputy editor at the Daily

Caller. He left in 2018 after past

writings for white national site were

dug up. And he once said of Tucker, so

this is Greer speaking, Tucker is

ultimately on our side. He can get

millions and millions of boomers to nod

along with talking points that would

have only been seen on Vair or American

Renaissance a few years ago. These are

both white national sites. So I guess

what do you make of that?

>> Yeah. So I'll tell you what I make of

it. And here's what I think is really

interesting about some of these figures

who were on the once kind of fringe

elements of the right who have in some

ways seen the errors of that way of

ideological thinking. And to me, you

always want to leave people room to to

grow up, room to leave bad ideas behind,

room for um kind of critical

self-reflection, and then to integrate

back into the kind of mainstream

thinking. And I think you know Scott

Greer is interesting and one of the

reasons why we interviewed him was to

kind of chart out this trajectory which

there's a lot of people that had more

radical politics and then they moderate

over time. And so I was very interested

in understanding that process of kind of

ideological development and growth and

then and then really scrutinizing you

want to actually try to figure out all

right well what's the way out of that?

What's the way to to demystify to defang

to to kind of delegitimize

that way of thinking? And I think it's

interesting to talk to people who once

had those ideas.

>> So, I'm not against you talking to him

at all. Right. What I'm saying is not

that you shouldn't interview Scott

Greer.

>> Sure.

>> I think many people change their

politics dramatically. And one of the

big problems the left actually has is

not giving people space to change.

>> Sure. and putting people into a a box

where they're held in who they were as

opposed to who they may become. My

problem is not with you.

>> I'm saying that I looked at Tucker in

that period and thought, "Huh, he's

going in this direction that I

understand this to be the argument of,

you know, a vair of a" and they all

celebrated him. But I guess the question

is whether to to phrase a question

precisely which maybe I haven't yet

whether

one of the lessons of where he has gone

and where some of the right has gone is

that people like you on the right were a

little insensitive to when something

wasn't just a breaking of a liberal

taboo but was a movement towards a

politics that was much more let's call

it white identity focused.

Look, I Okay, hu huge point. I I would

break it down in a couple ways. One, I I

I don't think that's that's quite

accurate. I actually think that the the

the statement you're you're reading, and

you could probably read it from a number

of other people, right? If you remember

in 2016,

uh Richard Spencer famously held like

some sort of uh conference or or or

group and he said, "Oh, yes, Trump has

um has adopted, you know, Trump is a

creation of the alt-right. We willed

Donald Trump into office. We made this

dream our reality.

And if we will it, it is no dream. A

quote I'm sure our friends at the

Anti-Defamation League know very well.

>> It was completely delusional. um totally

self-s serving and and uh uh a product

of narcissism that I wouldn't take uh at

face value. And so I think a lot of the

radical elements you're talking about

overstate

um uh overstate this relationship

because they desperately want to believe

it. And I think that um you know someone

like Tucker I I I don't I don't think

it's accurate to say that Tucker uh on

Fox in in you know 2021 was laundering

in you know talking points from you know

American Renaissance. I just I I I don't

think that's true. I think it's

conflating a kind of maybe superficial

opposition to immigration.

um and and the the conflation game is is

is really really really I think

dishonest and unfortunately for a lot of

time it worked and so I think that in

fact we're in a much better place than

in the past and I remember some of these

groups like ADL SPLC

um media matters you know they came

after me with many many smears trying to

destroy my reputation trying to get me

deplatformed from social media trying to

to kind of eliminate me from the public

sphere none of it worked Thankfully, the

ACLU, I would also add, um, and in fact,

as I look back, the arguments that they

were making were were were preposterous,

and they only succeeded because people

felt fear. And so, I I'm glad that we

don't live in that condition of fear

anymore. And today, we can talk very

reasonably across a table, which I think

is good. Um, but I'm certainly not going

to forget the emotional tone and the

political um, uh, vulnerabilities of

that era. And again, the SPLC that was

coming after me because of God knows

what

was at the same time giving money to

neo-Nazis and white nationalists to keep

them afloat. And what that shows me is

that the supply of racism in the United

States uh and including racism on the

right in the United States has dwindled

to such a small degree in real life that

it took the SPLC to actually inject cash

into that ecosystem merely to keep it

alive. And so I I just I just I I just

don't Yeah.

>> persuasive one way of thinking about

that period that I think is how I think

about it is that two things were sort of

true at the same time.

So one, there was way too much speech

policing. There was too much

cancellation. There was too much that

instead of being willing to have

arguments, people just tried to make the

arguments unhavable. That all happened,

right? I don't deny any of it.

And on the other hand, a lot of what

people more on the left in that moment

were afraid of or what they predicted

also happened. The alt-right moved much

more from the fringe to the center. I

always think about um

>> the alt-right was totally destroyed

after Charlottesville.

>> I I I

>> yeah,

>> I think maybe we have a different view

of what the alt-right represented.

>> Um which is fair enough, but I think a

lot of ideas

>> that were very very very far from the

center. I think about Elon Musk and him

writing and I mean later he had to like

try to figure out how to apologize for

this and but when somebody basically

said like the Jews have been funding the

grace replacement.

>> Did Elon say that?

>> Yeah.

>> No, Elon didn't say that. What he said

was underneath that he said to whoever

had tweeted that you have spoken the

truth and then he had to go to Ashwitz

and things like that.

>> Okay. The Ashwitz. Yeah.

>> The Ashwitz apology tour. So,

>> but you know, even now Musk is very

conspiratorial and where he is in 2026

now the world's first trillionaire

owning, you know, what used to be

Twitter.

>> Um, and the things he like kind of pumps

into the attentional stream would have

been considered incredibly marginal even

in Trump's first term. So, two things I

think were true, right? I think there

are many ways which the left went too

far and the thing the forces the left

were was worried were there are much

closer to the center. Yes, there are

parts of the alt-right that are not

significant today. Richard Spencer is

not a significant figure. Nick Fuentes

has a bigger audience than Richard

Spencer ever did.

>> Sure. And there is I mean when I'm on X

and other places, the amount of just

constant anti-semitism and anti-Indian

racism I see just happening in people's

mentions is wild to me. And I mean I

don't think he'll win, but you look at

Fishbach who's running for governor in

Florida, it's sort of almost

unimaginable to think of somebody like

him being a figure in Republican party

politics who would be commanding the

support of practically anybody. And I

think the reason that people worry about

him is they don't think he's going to

win, but he seems to be doing very well

among the young right.

>> Sure.

>> And so I think you can hold your view,

which I at least partially share, that

there are many ways in which the left

and the speech policing and the um you

know boundaries went too far. And also a

lot of the people who were most hair on

fire in that period had a point and some

of their more kind of wild predictions.

I was thinking about like if you had

told me that Trump was going to make RFK

Jr. HHS secretary and Tulsi Gabber DNI

um and try

>> the triumph of bipartisanship

>> and try and try to make Matt Gates

attorney general. I would have thought

that was like an unhinged like

resistance Substack take and then it all

happened. So it's like the fact you can

have these things be true at the same

time.

>> Yes. I I I think I think I think you're

you're kind of understating uh uh kind

of understating the dynamic on on one

side. I mean, it wasn't just about

speech policing. Um the after 2020, the

left maintained uh kind of apparatus of

social annihilation, and I went through

it myself. I had the ACLU subpoena me

and harass me with a lawfare campaign

that cost me a lot of money. I had the

SPLC and the ADL put me on some sort of

hate list that was totally bogus trying

to destroy my reputation. And so I had

people, you know, uh uh you know,

threats of violence against me that were

very credible at the time. Uh and so,

you know, people trying to get uh uh you

know, going after my family, my kids. I

mean, we shouldn't forget just how awful

that period was and how insane that

period was. And unfortunately, while I

think that many of the institutions on

the left have learned after having

suffered some consequences for enabling

that, um, the movements that they have

sparked, um, are in fact alive and well.

And look, I I I think the difference

that maybe you're not seeing is that the

radical, nihilistic, and violent

left-wing movements

have the full support of the left's

institutions.

And what we're talking about is a

radical, nihilistic movements on the

right do not have any institutional

support. and are bubble up in your

Twitter comments which again don't agree

um but is is different uh in kind not

just in quantity and in the case of

someone like James Fishbach I think it's

a great test fishbach is very

charismatic I think we would all agree

on that I talked with your colleague

Michelle Goldberg about this um but even

with a kind of individual charisma if

he's like the groper candidate for

governor of Florida which is again like

kind of a crazy thing that that is

happening thing. I want to see the

actual vote tally because that's going

to show me where he is um where he

stands with the actual conservative uh

population, the conservative voter, the

conservative movement as a whole. I

suspect that he's going to get

absolutely trounced. It happened with

Vivc running against a guy Casey Push uh

in Ohio. He got blown out by I don't

know 60 70 points. And so, um, by

contrast, you look at something like the

the the kind of trans ideological

movement, um, that I think is both kind

of a lie. It's it's grounded in in a

series of falsehoods, maintained this,

um, suppressive, threatening, sensorious

power in the kind of prelon Twitter days

and in the general kind of woke years.

And then look another uncomfortable fact

uh per capita has committed more mass

violence than any other group. And so I

I am willing to indulge in uh and and

think it's important to to have a kind

of criticism of let's say you know

elements of my own side. But I also

think that if we were to just measure it

out to put it on a scale, you know, it

it's it's looking a lot more like this

assassination's attempt against

President Trump, the assassination of

Charlie Kirk, the kind of security

posture that's required for

conservatives just to go on a college

campus. That's how I measure it. It's

like I'm looking at it. I'm feeling it.

I'm seeing it with my colleagues. After

Charlie Kirk was killed, I called all

the people, friends and colleagues in

the business. And I just like was

completely distraught for for for weeks.

And uh again, like while I don't support

uh you know, James Fishbach for

governor, again, I think that that's

kind of an empty symbolism. Whereas on

the other side, it feels like these

ideologies have the support of the

institutions. They wielded power

irresponsibly in the past and still have

the kind of ultimate political threat,

the threat of violence that I know

everybody in my world um um you know has

seen, has experienced, has has feared.

>> Um and so

>> I mean that grounds me do you not see

that? is that I don't have the same view

of it but let me hold as saying that

your experience of it I understand right

>> and as somebody who also you know

>> sometimes deals with threats of violence

and other things of that nature

>> I think the way this often looks to

people on the left particularly looks

right now

>> is that

when you say

these nihilistic I think you call them

ideals ideas are not held at high levels

of the right they're only supported

institution usually on the left. I see

it the opposite way.

>> Really?

>> Right. I see it the opposite way. And

I'll I'll explain why.

>> I don't see the SPLC, the Southern

Poverty Law Center, as like a powerful,

potent left-wing actor. They're not

>> really They could 10 years ago, they

could nuke you like I'll go through I'll

go through my thing.

>> Um ADL I don't even see as on the left,

which is a different question. I

understand. But I see the Trump

administration as powerfully and

potently extreme and willing to use the

power of the federal government from,

you know, deploying ICE and CBP agents

to different cities to directing the DOJ

who to investigate and go after to after

Charlie Kirk's murder trying to get

people fired who are just sort of random

people who had done shitty tweets. I do

not see a world in which there is this

huge separation between the extreme

elements of the right and this

administration. I keep hearing from

people like you, right, who I think has

talked about this, that there's a huge

number of gripers working in uh House

and Senate offices in Congress that, you

know, Bronze Age pervert is one of the

most uh popular people to read if you're

a Trump staffer. And I see those things

actually moving into things like

national security strategies, you know,

about the civilizational suicide of of

Europe. Now, I recognize we're not going

to agree on all this, right? This this

part I'm not going to try to like bridge

the gap. What I will say is that the the

other thing I think people on the left

see has been a a sort of movement from,

you know, 2016 to 2024 where it's almost

unbelievable how far things have gone,

right? Even Trump one to Trump 2 are

very very different beasts. And so all

of a sudden it doesn't look impossible

to imagine that Fuentes St. Carlson and

Fishbach

are the future not the fringe. I think a

lesson that has been burned into many of

us is that it is dangerous to dismiss

something that seems to have a lot of

energy around it as a fringe because

what is today's fringe is tomorrow's

maybe not center but much more live and

potent political force

>> and would you say that you saw that that

happen on the left between you know 2014

and and 2024

>> absolutely

>> yeah in part I think you guys are about

to learn some lessons we learned.

>> Yeah. Yeah. I mean, maybe so, but I

would argue that actually the right has

done a better job at managing it. And I

think we'll see, and I I hope I'm right

that with something like the fishback

campaign, you know, I think of James

Fishbach as a human meme, it's like

amazing. He's like, if you take the

mimemetic energy from that corner of the

online discourse and turned it into a

human being, it's like it would look and

sound like James Fishbach. But the

reality is that once those ideas gain

contact with the the the people, the

culture, the institutions on the right,

they're not going anywhere.

>> Let me try to frame this more in terms

of

>> Let me try to frame this more in terms

of arguments I've seen you making.

>> Sure.

>> And tell me if I get a chain in this

wrong, you tell me where I will. Right.

>> I think you think you now have a problem

with a racialist right.

I think watching the takeover of

conspiracies after Kirk's murder has

been

sobering or scary for a lot of people on

the right. To watch people accusing

Israel of it, to eventually see people

accusing Turning Points USA of it or

some kind of plot from the people around

him, I think has been for major major

figures on the right to be making those

arguments has seemed to me to be a kind

of shocking moment for a lot of you.

And then I've watched you and others,

you know, on X and elsewhere like look

in your mentions and be like, "Oh [ __ ]

there's a lot of racism here.

Something's happening." So you tell me

which part of this you don't agree with.

>> Yeah. Well, I I mean, here's how I see

it. And and your your general analysis

is correct. So there is a racialist uh

right, let's say. I've been writing

about this for a number of years, but I

think a lot of it is something of an

optical illusion where um and you see

this on the on on let's say on the left

where a small group of people that is

very loud online uh appears to represent

a larger share of a political coalition

or the general population uh than it

really does. And so, look, I don't want

a racialist right. That is that is like

a clear a clear position on my part. Um,

and I think to the extent that we have

like anti-semitic conspiracy theories uh

bubbling up from the the digital sphere,

it's a problem that we have to deal with

that and of untruth or a falsehood that

should be called out for what it is. And

and what I think it is at at heart is

that and I've talked to a lot of young

right-wing guys. So I sometimes I'll

I'll have lunch or dinner when I'm in DC

or elsewhere with younger guys and just

say, "Hey, you know, kind of walk me

through like what's happening for people

like we're older now. You and I you and

I are are are are middle-aged now. So

say, "Hey, walk me through this thinking

and not kind of non-judgmental, just

kind of help me understand what's

happening with some of the more kind of

radical or racialist uh young men." And

this is the the description that they

give. Um they say, you know, these are

guys who hit high school during COVID.

They they kind of transitioned into an

almost a purely digital life with all of

the various rabbit holes you could get

into. They came of age as a as a

function of your kind of entering

adulthood during the kind of George

Floyd hysteria where their teachers at

school, their media uh you know

institutions, the government, everyone

was saying, you know, you're a young

white man, you're the problem, you're

the oppressor, you're evil, you should

be denied opportunities because of your

uh biology, because of your your your

your ancestry.

and essentially that they were

programmed by the kind of George Floyd

hysteria into thinking racially and

instead of what I think is the the

proper and the correct response, which

is to say, we've got to move beyond

this, we're going to fight this

racialist thinking on the left, on the

right, wherever it comes from, they

essentially psychologically submitted to

it, but then reverse the polarity. Um, I

don't think that's a good way to to

pursue it. I don't think on the kind of

philosophical question it's it's it's

it's right. I don't think that from the

practical political uh conception it's

it's it's fruitful. Um but in a certain

way it's like I get it. I understand it.

Young people are um you know kind of in

a in a position of growing up and and

having a chip on your shoulder. I think

it's extremely destructive. And what I

see as um the the antidote to this, at

least within my political coalition, is

to be, you know, an older brother figure

to say, "Hey, I could get why you think

that." However, the actual path to

success is this other way. So, I I I

don't think that um I don't think that

this is like predetermined. I actually

think that young people have have, you

know, their their brain isn't still

their brain isn't locked in in its ways.

And so I think you you you want to bring

people who are frustrated um towards a

better path and and I think that someone

like Candace Owens who's just like

driving people into a ditch um you have

to kind of guide them away from that.

>> So I think first there's truth to that

narrative. I do think that one of the

things that happened over the past

decade or so and this is you know

something I talk about in my first book

why we're polarized is there's a huge

upsurge in

telling people that the right way to

understand life America is all through

the lens of identity groups. And when

you tell people to look at identity

groups, they will form a more coherent

sense of their own. And a line I have in

that book is identity activates under

threat.

>> Sure. And so the more you tell people

that their identity is the problem, the

more they're going to begin to defend

that identity and feel that identity and

begin to self-define around that

identity. So I think all of that

happened the and I think that you would

also you would also agree perhaps that

you know the institutions the legal

system the prevailing narrative at

universities corporations etc was

explicitly anti-white for a number of

years that for these young people were

formative

>> I think it's sometimes moved into being

anti-white I would not say it was all

explicit hundreds of reports on this

from institutions from banks

corporations

white man bad. If you wanted to just put

it into kindergarten language, white man

bad. That was the dominant position

initution. I remember telling people

around me that this thing where people

are putting out like papers on what are

the

negative traits of whiteness

was a disaster. Right. So I don't

necessarily disagree with that. I think

there's truth to it. and and legally

affirmative action DEI was institutional

governmentbacked discrimination against

one racial group.

>> So the thing that I am interested in

though here is that you're now in power

and a lot

>> personally I live on a farm in

Washington state. I'm personally not in

your executive orders get passed the

whole thing

>> and these things can all go in better or

worse directions. These are all

longstanding energies in American life.

the the sort of argument I'm going to

make to to be you know cards on the

table about what I'm doing please

>> is that I think

the um empirical and epistemological

structures on the right and the the

habits they took on in order to win

are playing with passions that are very

dangerous like I'll give a good example

of this

>> sure

>> you can believe what you want about

whether or not the immigration of

Haitians into Springfield, Ohio was good

or bad. The people of that city had

mixed views on it. I mean, the the mayor

and others were very pro and it had been

good for the economy and Springfield had

been in a period of decline and then you

had a large Haitian influx.

And then you get into this thing that

happened in 2024 about Haitians eating

cats and dogs where there's a Facebook

post and

the right all the way up to Donald Trump

in one of the debates begins adopting

it. You sort of go on a quest to try to

figure out if it's true. And you know to

shorthand a long story maybe in Dayton,

Ohio there was somebody who wasn't

Haitian.

>> Correct. who maybe somebody thought but

other people didn't think had eaten a

cat that

somebody and other people is is quite is

is quite quite important.

>> People can read your piece. They can

read the drop site news article. I'm not

going to convince you,

>> but the drop site news article they went

out to debunk my story and they ended up

finding another independent

corroborating witness. So,

>> it's not how I read it, not how they

read it, but I on some level am not even

focused on that.

What I'm saying is that when you get

very into

moves like we are going to accuse broad

communities of eating cats and dogs,

which I think we can all agree um

Haitians are not in general eating cats

and dogs, you are going to unleash forms

of anger and hatred and fear that are

not controllable. And I think one of the

mistakes the right has made and frankly

people like you have made is thinking

these passions can then be coralled

again this idea that you can find these

really um

uh high passion like mimemetic

containers that then you say well the

real issue here is just we want to have

a conversation about how much is the

appropriate level of Haitian immigration

into Springfield Ohio but that the way

you get people to care about it JD Vance

said this very explicitly is that well

people really care about the the cats

and dogs. The American media totally

ignored this stuff until Donald Trump

and I started talking about cat memes.

If I have tome

create stories so that the American

media actually pays attention to the

suffering of the American people then

that's what I'm going to do Dana because

you guys are completely letting Kla

Harris coast. Um, which again I think my

view is that there's never been any hard

evidence of that happening in the

Haitian community in Springfield, Ohio.

Like nobody has substantiated that and

nor have you.

>> Correct. Yeah. I haven't made that. And

in fact, I've said look, there's no

evidence of this particular claim. We

should be more careful.

>> And so there's been a a kind of

consistent like

>> the this idea that you could unleash

like really I think quite terrible

passions and then hold it to a level

that that is controllable. And what

you're seeing with Candace Owens, what

you're seeing with the new Tucker

Carlson or the old Tucker Carlson,

however you want to call it, what you're

seeing with Nick Fuentes and the rise of

Nick Fuentes, who we've not really

talked about, but I think is a a a

necessary figure of thinking uh in the

way we think about this, is that there

wasn't a way to stop that move. like

once people began to move in that

direction and there weren't sort of

institutions that were strong enough and

respected enough to to stop it that the

place it's going on the right when you

talk about it becoming a third world to

click farm is quite dangerous and quite

grim and now I will let you say

everything you think

>> well oh man all right where do I start

couple couple huge problems I gave you a

lot a couple a couple huge problems I

mean

>> one is that you know and and I'm doing

reporting in California right now that

has uh that has stories that have a

similar kind of let's say shock value.

For example, we did a story on um

migrants from Mexico and Honduras who

come to San Francisco and get free sex

change surgeries from the California

state uh medical system. This is a kind

of explosive story that is true that

represents I think a lot of these

underlying questions about homelessness

policy about immigration etc.

Look, if it's true, it's fair game. And

there's a way to handle these stories in

a responsible way, that you ensure the

facts, that you present it fairly, and

that you uh use it as a method of

changing public opinion. Like, that's

how it's supposed to work. And and so I

I I think that

the idea that there are taboos uh uh

that that cannot be crossed because they

will unleash uh these these kind of

unspecified or vague dangerous passions.

I think it's pro is is a problem in in

two regards. one is that

if you're if you're going for truth

seeeking, if you're going if you're

playing a a kind of responsible

rhetorical game, um no, I don't think

that these questions are out of bounds

at all. Um but second, the predictions

have always been um you know that it's

going to unleash some kind of horrible

nivist violence sentiment, etc. And but

the only example of of an

ideologicaldriven assassination that

we've talked about today is the

assassination of Charlie Kirk. The this

kind of prophecy of political violence

is is really comes uh from the

institutional ideologies on the left,

not the institutional ideologies on the

right. Um and I think that I that that

fact has been hammered home over and

over and over these last few years. Um

and and look like those of us on the

right who who who are in this business.

Um you know probably have to have like

uh you know a little bit more firmness

to say no the facts are not on this on

your side in this argument.

>> So let me be more specific about what

I'm saying because I'm not making a

vague prophecy of political violence. Um

and I'm also not saying that there are

these taboos you shouldn't touch. I

think where I'm disagreeing is to say

that there actually isn't truth seeeking

here. There isn't enough truth in these

arguments. There's too much of an

attraction.

>> Which arguments?

>> So the and it I mean arguments like the

Haitian cats and dogs. We'll talk we'll

talk about others in a second.

>> Um

>> and that the thing I'm worried about has

arrived, right? I'm not talking about an

unspecified future in which I am

concerned the right will increasingly be

taken over by conspiratorial

um racist misogynistic elements. I'm

looking at a world where Nick Fuentes is

a major figure on the American right.

>> Well, you guys are doing a great job at

at at at raising his profile.

>> Tucker Carlson is a guy who raised his

profile,

>> which I think was a mistake. I think it

is legitimate to say Tucker is the

biggest figure in right-wing media and

he brought on Nick Fundes because and

gave him such a gentle kind interview.

And Tucker, here's one thing I don't

underestimate with Tucker. He's [ __ ]

good. He's a good interviewer. He is

incredible talent as a media figure. If

he wanted to cut that guy apart, he

could have. As he did to Mike Huckabe

when he wanted to do that or to Ted Cruz

when he wanted to do that. Those who

bless Israel will be blessed and those

who curse Israel will be cursed. And

from my perspective, I want to be on the

blessing side of things.

>> Oh, the those who bless the government

of Israel,

>> those who bless Israel is what it says.

Doesn't say the government of it says

the nation of Israel. So that's in the

Bible. As a Christian, I believe that.

>> Where is that?

>> I I can find it to you. I I don't have

the the scripture off the tip of my You

pull out the phone and use the

>> It's in Genesis. But so you're quoting a

a Bible phrase. You don't have context

for it and you don't know where in the

Bible it is, but that's like your

theology. I'm confused.