ESPN Viewers Melt Down Over Trump

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From the heart of our nation's capital, Washington, D.C., backed by the trusted voices of Team Fox, a clear, fresh voice cutting through the noise to tell the truth. It's Guy Benson with Guy Benson. It is Wednesday, November 12, 2025. Welcome everyone to Guy Benson. I'm Guy Benson. So glad to have you along with us for the next three hours between 3 and 6 p.m. Eastern time. That's every weekday. And then around the clock for free on our podcast, no charge on demand when the show is over. I'm a Fox News contributor scheduled to join America's Newsroom tomorrow. So you can tune in for that Fox News channel. On the radio, great lineup today. U.S. Senator John Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a real character, always hilarious, also insightful. Republican of Louisiana. We played a clip from him just yesterday. He will join us live coming up later this hour. Josh Holmes of Team Ruthless will be here. He lived through a lot of shutdown style battles on Capitol Hill, and he's not surprised to see the Democrats ultimately losing this one and now seemingly imploding over it. We'll talk to him about that. Plus Will Kane on culture, sports, politics. We always have a wide-ranging discussion with Will. Looking forward to that in our final hour today. As we come on the air, There's a lot of different things we can get to, including the ins and outs here in D.C., the timeline on the shutdown votes and the acrimony on the left and some of the drama on the right. We might touch on that a little bit later this hour. I want to start instead in Illinois and talk a bit about the governor of that state, J.B. Pritzker, who wants to be president. We spend a good amount of time here on the show talking about another Democrat governor. a failure in my mind, out in the state of California, and rightfully so, right, that guy's been obviously angling for the White House for years. J.B. Pritzker feels like he can be president as well, and he is debasing himself on a regular basis to try to show off for his party's base and give them what they want. And what they want is demented, quite frankly. And for those of you listening to us on the Big 89 WLS, you are very familiar with J.B. Pritzker, especially the type of politician that he's become. He's always, you know, this Democrat from a very wealthy family, quite progressive, running the state into the ground with that one party rule in Illinois. That's kind of par for the course. He has gotten, in my view, at least, my estimation a lot worse recently because of these national ambitions. Yesterday on the show, we told you, and we were talking to Bill Malugent about this, that there were shots fired at Border Patrol officials in Chicago, in Illinois. This just happened a few days ago.

not to be confused with any of the other violent assaults against federal immigration officials, which is we've been seeing that. Unfortunately, I've been seeing those types of incidents, uh, incidents rather play out throughout the country, all across the country, really. including a deadly shooting in Dallas, Texas from a sniper, a deranged, unhinged, anti-ice left-wing sniper, ended up murdering illegal immigrants by accident. He was aiming for ice. There was another attack on an ice facility in Texas. There are other examples that have cropped up, unfortunately, around the United States. with depending on what numbers you hear, an 800% to 1,000% increase on these violent attacks against our federal agents. A lot of them have been coming in Chicago land, including just recently with those shots fired. Local CBS in Chicago reported on it, just by way of background here, cut 13. Over in Little Village, the Department of Homeland Security claims shots were fired at agents during an immigration operation there yesterday. Here's video of that chaotic scene near 26 and Kedsi. DHS claims an unknown man and a black jeep fired the shots at agents before leaving the area. At one point, you'll see agents deploying tear gas. We saw Chicago police respond to the scene and disperse the crowd allowing border. patrol to eventually leave that area. Police say there were no reports of anyone struck by gunfire. So far, we don't know of any arrest in connection to reports of shots being fired. And then the update yesterday was that arrests, or at least one, had been made in connection with those attacks, those gunshots at federal agents. This coming in an environment in which J.J.B. Pritzker... who's the, as I said, Democratic governor of the state, has been making all kinds of Nazi comparisons when it comes to not just Donald Trump and the Trump administration, but also ICE and Border Patrol, calling them jackbooted thugs, explicitly invoking Nazi imagery. Right? This is what he does on a regular basis and then cynically tries to pretend. Like, oh, no, I'm not doing that. I'm not making any. I'm not comparing anyone to Nazis. No, he's saying Nazis and Hitler routinely. Jack booted thugs is how he described those federal agents terrorizing, quote, unquote, the city of Chicago when what they're trying to do is enforce federal immigration laws, especially among convicted criminal illegal immigrants. And because the moment, the political moment on the left, calls for full resistance if that means demagoguing the hell out of ICE officers as they're being targeted with violent attacks, J.B. Pritzker is like, sign me up. He is happy to do it. We also know that there have been hits put out on some of these officials, including specific named.

officials, law enforcement officers, with gangs reportedly saying, we will pay out rewards if you shoot and or kill some of these federal agents. That's part of this mix as well, which is extremely disturbing. It should be to anyone. You would think people like J.B. Pritzker could say, listen, I'm opposed to the policy, and I'm definitely in favor of resisting it, but we cannot have any violence. And you'd think he could say that loudly on a regular basis. I'm not sure I've heard him say it at all. And there's something that he just said yesterday that I want to play for you that I think is really, really sick. Because in the aftermath of shots fired at CBP officers in Chicago and reports that there were hits put out, there was an arrest made for one of these murder for hire orders from a gang leader. Arrests were made on this front. threatening the lives of officers and one guy in particular leading that group in Chicago. J.B. Pritzker, the leader of the state of Illinois, he was responding yesterday to reports at least that maybe these CBP officers or this group, they were going to leave Chicago. That was the rumor at least. And he was taking questions at a press conference. This was yesterday. And the question was about Gregory Bovino, who's the leader of this group, the CBP group. And I would just mention again, CBP officers have been involved and instrumental in keeping America safe from Chinese threats recently, from Islamist ISIS-tied threats. They're trying to make the streets of Illinois and Chicago safer. J.B. Pritzker is fighting them tooth and nail, calling them every name in the book, invoking Hitler, saying nothing to tamp down the violent attacks. And then we have specific hits put out, including against Gregory Bovino. And shots fired at that guy's officers. And here is what J.B. Pritzker had to say yesterday about the rumor that they might be... diminishing their footprint in the city or leaving altogether. Listen to this. Cut 11. The question was about Gregory Bovino and CBP possibly leaving Chicago. I read the same thing. You know they don't communicate directly with us and never have. All I can say is that whether it was the loss in the elections a week ago that's led to Donald Trump deciding to pull CBP out. or the fact that Gregory Bovino is a snowflake on a day when you can see some snowflakes. Whatever it is, the people of Chicago have deserved better than having CBP and Gregory Bovino in this city. But I would not say that we're now going to be free of these terrorized neighborhoods because ICE and CBP probably will still be here.

though they will have fewer people, and we'll have to continue to protect our neighbors and our friends and our families. And I will work very hard, continue to do that to keep people safe. It's all so backwards. We have to continue to protect our neighbors and our friends and our families, and we're going to keep getting terrorized. He's not talking about the criminal illegal aliens living in Illinois. The crimes that they've committed over and over again terrorizing neighborhoods and individuals committing additional crimes as they feel empowered, emboldened. impervious to accountability to do so because of the sanctuary policies of the city of Chicago and of J.B. Pritzker. He's talking about maintaining safety and protection against the terrorists in his mind, the federal agents, trying to do their jobs, do their sworn duty, and enforce the laws of this country. And notice he says, well, If Gregory Bovino and CBP are possibly leaving Chicago, maybe it's because Trump suffered an election loss last week, so he's running scared, or, quote, the fact that Gregory Bovino is a snowflake. Like, oh, he's chickening out. He's cutting and running because he's a snowflake. He's talking about someone who has had a hit put out on him by gangs. and whose officers were under literal fire a few days ago. And here's J.B. Pritzker waddling out there with a smirk on his face, be like, oh, maybe he's just a snowflake. How would you interpret that other than at least a wink and a nod, approving of, indulging, or certainly not full-throatedly denouncing violence and violent threats? It's almost as if J.B. Pritzker is affirmatively on the side of not just illegal immigrants and illegal immigrant criminals, but actual violent gangs and people taking pot shots at federal agents in his jurisdiction. That's how it sounds to me. He calls them basically Nazi enforcers and jackbooted thugs terrorizing people. Gang members, I think there's a Latin king. They're like, all right, let's kill. The federal agent in charge in exchange for some money, this is an established fact. They've got these shoot-on-site orders, authorization apparently from these gangs, or at least one of them in Chicago, for these types of officers. And then someone did, in fact, shoot at them. Just in the last couple of days, and J.B. Pritzker gets asked about it. He's like, oh, they might be leaving Snowflake. He is pandering in a very sick way. And that's on him. It's a terrible reflection on J.B. Pritzker. Unfortunately, you only pander for a reason if you're a politician. He's not doing this entirely out of his own moral deficiencies. He's doing it because he thinks and or knows there is a market for this kind of politics in his party.

Because he wants to be president. So this is how he's handling it, which says something, I think, more broadly about the situation we have on our hands with the political left in this country. Big problems on the right. Big, ugly, nasty problems on the right. And we've delved into some of that here. But the assassination culture right now that we are seeing not especially marginalized on the left is genuinely so disturbing and evil. One more point about the pandering of J.B. Pritzker, who wants to be your president, everyone. He just a few days ago spoke at the Illinois Federation of Teachers. So big Teachers Union, filled with the Teachers Union bosses in the state of Illinois. And he gave his big rah-rah speech to them. I'll play you the sound bite in a second where he decided to drop an F-bomb because that's also the cool thing that all the Democrats have to do to show how much they're for the resistance and how badass they are against Donald Trump. Keep in mind, Illinois schools, especially in Chicago, so many of them are failing on a vast scale. There are dozens of schools in Illinois, these public government-run schools. dominated by this union, where zero students can perform at grade level, zero. So J.B. Pritzker shuffles over to talk to these. cronies of his because it's all this incestuous thing where they take their money from taxpayer dollars and they then push it into their own paychecks right and they're constantly threatening strikes and that sort of thing to bring their paychecks up higher and higher then they launder that money right back into the coffers of the democratic party so these people maintain their vice grip on education in the state no matter how badly they're failing that's like an afterthought So J.B. Pritzker's there to condemn anyone who might want something different than that racket. Offering, for example, school choice to families that are not billionaires like his. He went to private school. Many in his family went to private school. They can do whatever they want. When he shuts down the state in COVID, they can go to Wisconsin and Florida as they did. But for the little people, he wants this union still in charge of everything, of their kids. And here's J.B. Pritzker showing what a tough guy he is on that whole issue, cut eight. Republicans want to take billions away from public schools and pump it into private institutions. They want to punish teachers for telling the truth. They want to criminalize educators for supporting LGBTQ students. They want to turn classrooms into cultural war battlegrounds. And I'm sorry to be vulgar, but Donald Trump and his cronies can fuck all the way off. You pander because it's what people want to hear. Huge cheer.

Sorry to be vulgar. No, he's not. He's eager to be vulgar. Trump can F all the way off. He said to a room full of teachers, union, apparatchiks, and bosses who want to maintain their interests and their control and their financial interests at the expense of kids and their families. And that laundry list of negatives that he went through, it's so much projection. blaming the other side for things that they're doing, like turning classrooms into culture war battlegrounds. That's what they've been doing. And they demonize anyone who notices or objects. Say, hey, let's give some choices to families and kids where these schools are failing. And the response from J.B. Pritzker is, bleep all the way off. And it's not just Donald Trump, he's saying that message to you. That's a double middle finger to those kids and those families. Just like he's giving a double middle finger to federal agents who are getting shot at in his state. Congratulations on your leadership, Illinois. And he wants to take his show national. Make no mistake. We're just getting started. It's Guy Benson. Wednesday edition. Don't go anywhere. We will be right back. Miss a minute. Miss a lot. Guy Benson. Fox News is streaming live on Fox One, bringing you the stories you won't hear anywhere else. Live coverage, sharp analysis, real perspective. Stream now. I'm Guy Benson, we're back. So this evening, the House scheduled to vote to reopen the government on what was just past 60, 40 in the Senate days ago. overcoming the Democrat filibuster, which had sustained the Democrat government shutdown. House Democrats whipping no on this. They want to keep the government shut down. That's their position. As I keep saying, it's a Democrat shutdown. And reopening the government has been fought at every turn by Democrats. But it seems, at least for now, like they'll have the votes. We'll keep an eye on that tonight. And perhaps this stupid nightmare will end in a matter of hours. Senator Robert F. Kennedy Jr. up next. Summer means firing up the grill, getting together with friends, and making the most of the weekends. Total Wine and More is my first stop. Whether it's Celsius and ready to serve cocktails with a cooler or a good bottle of bourbon. Everything I need is at Total Wine. With the lowest prices, it's easy to stock up for whatever the weekend brings, and I can get everything I need in one stop. Shop Total Wine and More and get ready for your next summer party. Spears are not sold in Virginia or North Carolina. Drink responsibly must be 21.

New talk for a new generation, Guy Benson. Back here on Guy Benson, delighted to have you joining us, Guy Benson.com, podcast always free. With us now, U.S. Senator John Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a Republican of Louisiana. He's got a new book out just a few weeks ago. It's called How to Test Negative for Stupid and Why Washington Never Will. Senator, welcome back to the show. Thank you, Guy. Thank you for having me. You know, it does seem like a good thing in life to be able to test negative for stupid. How can one do that? Well, read my book. It's not a policy book per se. It's a storybook. But I use stories to talk about policy. Many of the stories will make you laugh, I think. Some of them... are bizarre, but all of them are true. And I use these stories to try to explain to the American people what the Senate in Washington is really nice from the inside, why normal in Washington, D.C. is just a setting on the clothes dryer, and why it doesn't have to be that way if we just use a little common sense. I hope the book will make people think. Maybe it'll make you laugh. Maybe it'll make you day drink. But it's all true. Well, if it's going to make someone day drink, we should definitely get a copy to producer Christine. Now, here's the thing. You just mentioned that the stories that you tell are bizarre but true out of the depths of the belly of the beast inside the Beltway. We've had a bizarre but true story playing out now for, what is it, 43 days, something like that. This government shut down that the Democrats have caused. It's their baby. It's their shutdown. Now they're very angry that it's apparently going to end, we think, in a matter of hours. You were on the Ruthless podcast a few weeks ago last month, and we have Josh Holmes from that show joining us later today on the program. You made this prediction. We played it yesterday, but now we have you here. So we'll play it for the audience again. This was your prediction back then about what the Danumont of all this would eventually look like. Cut 18. Here's how I predict Chuck Schumer's going to get out of it. I could be wrong. But I think we're not going to budge. And he's going to be forced to go to six or eight of his Democratic Senate colleagues. And Sengok, I need a favor. vote to get me out of this shutdown. He said, now, he's going to tell him, now, look, I got to vote no. And I got a dog cuss you a little bit. We've got to make it. We've got to have some play acting and make this look good. And then we come out of the shutdown, but Bernie, you know, he's tough. But the danger, Bernie, I'm serious. What he's got to watch, he doesn't want to look like he's had a mutiny. Because then he's weaker than when he went in. And he wasn't strong then.

All right, Senator. So you basically nailed it, right? Like bingo, bullseye, et cetera. But it seems to me, and I wonder what your analysis is from the inside of the Senate here. It seems to me that this has played out precisely as you said it would. And yet they've played it so badly that on top of the failure theater that they're engaged in, no one on their side is happy with that. And so the mutiny is happening regardless. Am I missing something here? No, I don't think you are. Well, Stevie Wonder could see this coming. 43 days ago, our country was rocking along, minding its own business. Our current budget was expiring, but we had been negotiating with the Democrats to pass a new budget. And we said, look, let's just... Keep government open. Continue with the current budget. Chuck Schumer comes to us at the last minute and says, I'm going to shut it down unless you give me $1.5 trillion, unless you've got the one big, beautiful bill that we just passed, like a fish. And he said, we're going to tell you, we the Democrats, how you're going to spend the money. Well, as I've said before, my mother didn't raise a fool guy, and if she did, it was one of my brothers. I wasn't going to vote for that. No Republican was. And Chuck just shut it down. He just shut it down. But I knew, given his unserious demands, I said, this is not going to end well, and he's going to get out on the limb. And he's going to have to go to his colleagues and beg to be bailed out while at the same time pretending that he didn't want to be bailed out of this. And that's what happened. I mean, it was just what he wanted was so unsurious, guy. I said this the other day. He put the funk in dysfunction. It was so bad. And he just dug up more snakes than he could kill. And we didn't give them anything. A lot of people were hurt. A lot of people went through a lot of pain because of Senator Kersumer's personal politics. The expectation is that pain will start to end later this evening when the House takes up and adopts the bill that you guys passed out of the Senate because, as you predicted, and many of us thought this would happen, eight Senate Democrats joined forces with you guys to get this thing finally passed after well over a month of all of this dysfunction and harm. In exchange for what? Like, there's still the base is angry. Most Democrats are at least pretending to be very angry that the shutdown's coming to an end. I don't know what they thought realistically they were going to get out of this. And at the same time, and I'm never going to stop making this point, as long as we're discussing this shutdown, at the same time they're trying to say it's a Republican shutdown. It's a Republican shutdown that the Republicans tried to end 15 times that the Democrats refuse to end and are now furious that it is ending, but it's your fault. What?

Well, there was a lot of play acting. And if you look, exactly eight Democrats joined with us, not nine, not seven, not ten, exactly eight. And they were all Democrats for the most part, who are not running for re-election, who are going to retire, or who are in very safe seats. Now, I'm glad they did. I don't misunderstand me. I look for grace wherever I can find it. But my only disappointment, we did not give up anything. My only disappointment was that we had a chance on the last day to... introduce a change to the resolution that would have stopped this from happening in the future. I wanted to provide that no senator could be paid during a shutdown. Now, some of my colleagues said, well, it violates the Constitution, which says our compensation can't be changed. But I crafted a way, in my opinion, to make it constitutional. Leadership, Republican leadership, and the Senate wouldn't let me do it. But I'm not going to give up on getting the vote on that. And you think it is the way that you've worded this, you think you can get it to pass constitutional muster? Yes. If you want to stop both sides from having a shutdown, you just do two things. You say, look, you can't be paid during the shutdown. And number two, You can't leave Washington, D.C. To be fair, let's say you can't go further than 100 miles from Washington, D.C. You can't go on. If you do that, they won't shut it down. But we didn't learn something, aside from the fact that Chuck Schumer's demands and behavior were both feckless. We learned, we knew it anyway, that Obamacare is just broken. We were told it was going to make premiums cheaper and insurance more accessible. It's done neither. Trying to continue the status quo will be like putting fresh paint on rotten wood. And we're going to have a vote before the end of the year on the Obamacare exchanges and the subsidies, and we, meaning the Republicans, we've already started. plan on proposing a new way of providing insurance to people that looks like somebody designed it on purpose. Okay, so I'm actually very intrigued by that because I agree with you that this is a health care crisis. Again, it's been a topsy-turvy, a little bit mind-bending, to watch these Democrats say it's a Republican shutdown that we are exclusively voting for and refusing to end, and now we're mad that it's ending.

And the reason that we're doing the shutdown that we're not doing because it's a Republican shutdown is because of the health care crisis. That's the Republicans' fault. And it's like, well, Republicans had zero votes in favor of Obamacare. They all voted against it. They had zero votes in favor of these emergency temporary COVID-era subsidies. They had zero votes in favor of extending it. They had zero votes in favor of the deadline that the Democrats set at the end of the year. It's been 100% the Democrats' fault. And now they're again saying, oh, it's the Republican health care crisis. And they'll say, well, because it's happening under Republican control with Trump in office. It's their fault, even though it's the Democrats who have. literally voted all of this into existence, all of these problems into existence. So yes, by all means, hammer them for that. But I think the American people are looking at premiums going up and saying this is not affordable. They might be willing to say, sure, Obamacare's not working, but now what? You said you guys are going to introduce reforms. What do those look like? Well, everything you just said is true. And the mistake that my Democratic colleagues made, they make it off. They think the American people are stupid. Now, the American people may not read Aristotle every day because they're too busy earning a living. But they're certainly not stupid. Eventually, they figure it all out. They know that Obamacare is not working. What we're going to try to do, number one, these subsidies right now that we're talking about, these are checks. $30 billion worth of checks, taxpayer money, is given directly to the insurance companies. We're going to stop doing that. We're going to make them available in terms of premium support that goes directly to the American people. We're going to look at things like association health plans. We're going to look at things like reestablishing high-risk pools. in every state that wants one so that people with pre-existing conditions can find affordable insurance. We're knocking around a number of ideas. We've appointed four people to put together all of our ideas. Dr. Roger Marshall, Dr. Bill Cassidy, Rick Scott, who's a former health care executive. Mike Crapo, who's the chairman of the Finance Committee, and has jurisdiction. And we're going to have a plan ready within the next, I don't know, two and a half, three weeks. Now, we won't have enough time to do everything we want, but I have been strongly encouraging majority leader Foon to please, let's go do another reconciliation bill where we don't need Democratic votes. and we can finish the health care reform in another reconciliation bill. Now, so far, John Thune hasn't agreed with me, but I'm going to chase him. I'm going to chase him like he tried to steal Christmas. I'm not going to let up. We passed the one big, beautiful bill without Democratic votes to reconciliation. We never would have passed it without reconciliation.

We have two more chances to do reconciliation bills. We should take advantage of both of them. Before the midterms, you mean? Before, absolutely. Absolutely. Now, I'm not saying we shouldn't talk to our Democratic colleagues. We should. But on a lot of the things that we want to do, they're just not going to agree. I hope I'm wrong. But I doubted. It sounds like, as I saw reporting just a little while ago, that Hakeem Jeffries, ahead of this vote this evening to reopen the government, he's going to offer a discharge petition, which is the minority tool in the House, to say, all right, this is our substitute bill, which is a three-year extension of these emergency, quote-unquote, temporary, quote-unquote, COVID-era subsidies, including for quite wealthy people under Obamacare. He wants a three-year extension. The offer from Chuck Schumer the other day was a one-year extension. All the previous extensions, this whole scheme was Democrat only. Now they want the Republicans at least co-signing on some of this failure now. Is it your understanding that your colleagues are lock, stock, barrel against any extension of these emergency temporary Democrat band-aids? Not without fixing them. And look, Minority Leader, Hakeem Jeffries, I don't mean disrespect, but he needs to put down the crack pipe. He knows we're not going to just rubber stamp as that's what we have now. It's just fresh paint on a rotten wood. Now, in fairness, the minority leader, he's scared, like a lot of the Democrats. The loon wing, the Bolshevik wing, the socialist wing of the party, whatever you want to call it, is in control. The leader of that movement is Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. And the congresswoman is going to do one of the three things in the foreseeable future. She's either going to run against Akeem, her speaker. She's going to run against Chuck Schumer for the New York Senate spot or she's going to run for president. I mean, she just elected a socialist as mayor of New York. And so that's what's motivating a lot of this guy, is just political fear about what the Democratic Party has become. Not all Democrats believe all of this stuff. Not all Democrats believe that... believe that men can breastfeed. Not all of these folks believed in open borders, but the loom wing of their party does and did, and they are in control, and more reasonable members, are scared to say anything. Oh, yeah, and I've been quoting it now fairly incessantly for the last couple of weeks, but the Hill newspaper had a quote from a Democrat Senate source saying that weeks ago. There were enough Senate Democrats who wanted to reopen the government. They wouldn't do it because they were scared of the, I think, proverbial guillotine from their base, which is what you're describing here. And as long as that remains an ascendant coalition in that party, I think we'll see more of this kind of thing. U.S. Senator John Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of Louisiana, our guest here on Guy Benson. His book sounds quite essential, actually, how to test negative for stupid.

and why Washington never will, case in point the last 43 days or so. Senator, appreciate your time as always. Thank you, God. Thank you for having me. Let's step aside real quick and come right back on Guy Benson. Not the same talking points here, Guy Benson. What is Toyota affordability? It all starts with buying smart, and your Toyota dealer has great deals available to qualified customers on reliable cars and SUVs, including the redesigned Rav4, Spacious Grand Highlander, Sporty Camrys, and Corolla's. It means driving for less with efficient hybrid and plug-in hybrid options available throughout the lineup, extending your overall driving range and delivering great MPGs, saving you money at the pump. And it means trading for more. Toyota is known for building long-lasting vehicles and has the best resale value brand according to Kelly Blue Book, your Toyota can be worth thousands more than average when it's time to trade in. That's Toyota affordability. Buy smart, drive for less, and trade for more. Shop Toyota.com or your local dealer for deals and details. Vehicles projected resale value is specific to the 2026 model year. For more information, visit Kelly Blue Books, KB.com. Toyota brand average resale value is 53% versus the average vehicle at 45%. Toyota, let's go places.

Back here on Guy Benson, I've had this fascination with the Senate race in Maine, and we're a year out. But there's this Graham Platner character, the Nazi tattoo guy, who called himself a communist as well. The one who said that he thinks white, rural people are racist and stupid, and that all cops are bastards, I believe is what he said. Among many other things, that guy. He's all the rage, all the hotness on the left in Maine. And they really want him to be the Senate nominee against Susan Collins in what could be a really important race up there. She's running for re-election, the moderate Republican. And based on at least some of the polling, since the Nazi tattoo communism, all of it came out, he maintains a huge lead in the Democratic primary. Others have shown it closer. But here's a general election poll from a Democratic source. Susan Collins up nine against him, up 19 with bad info about him. Yikes. Another hour coming up. This episode is brought to you by Adobe Firefly, the all-in-one creative studio with AI-powered image and video generation. Built for today's creative process, Firefly helps you generate, edit, and experiment fast. Because the asks aren't getting smaller. And the timelines? Ooh, yeah, still tight. With all the best creative AI models in one place, Firefly brings your ideas to life. Learn more at Adobe.com slash Firefly. A new generation of conservative talk. Right here, right now. Fair, fun, and backed by the trusted voices and reporting resources of Fox News. Fox News. You're listening to Guy Benson. And now here's your host, Guy Benson.

It's a brand new hour here on Guy Benson. Thanks so much for tuning in. Guy Benson.com, the website, our podcast is always free every day on demand as soon as the show is over. Email us, GBS at Fox.com. You can follow me as well at Guy Benson on social media at Guy Benson for the program account as well. So I want to address something that happened a few days ago. Turning Point USA held an event at Auburn University in Alabama. and there was a Q&A segment of that event featuring Eric Trump, the son of the president, and his wife, Lara, who's also a host at Fox News. And a student got up and asked something about Trump and Israel and got some applause in the room for it. And I saw on social media, a lot of people on elements of the right and even the left were saying, oh, this is great. We love this type of question. I want to talk about it. Here it is cut one, the student asking. I'd like to ask about your father's relationship with Israel. He's taken over $230 million from pro-Israel groups. During the summer against Iran, even though he advised against it, Israel still attacked Iran and the U.S. still bombed on behalf of Israel. Your father's frustrations with the Benjamin Netanyahu have been made clear. when he cursed on national TV over the situation. Israel has not been a great ally to the U.S. all the way since 1960 when they bombed the USS Liberty. Israel is a nation where Christians are constantly under attack in both Gaza and the West Bank. We talk about America first and defending Christians, but how can we do this if we align ourselves with a nation that does not do that itself?

Okay, so you hear some of the applause there from people in the hall, and I think that is just a deeply wrong and misinformed question. And Eric Trump and Laura, they had their responses talking about Iran, defending the president, and you can go and watch that video for yourself if you'd like to. I just want to break down what we just heard in the question, because I feel like if we just let it simmer out there, if we let it metastasize. Like, oh, well, it's a fair question. Why are we doing those things? Then people might start to assume that the underlying premises are correct, which they are not. So the first part was Trump has taken over $230 million from pro-Israel groups. I don't know if that's true or not. I know that there's a lot of money that flies around in politics, whether it's $230 million or less. I don't think Trump is motivated in this case. by political donations. I also don't blame pro-Israel Americans for donating to Trump, especially given the alternative, given what we saw over four years from the Biden administration, what we saw especially in the campaign of Kamala Harris, who was going to be, I think, even more hostile. Israel is a great and close ally to the U.S. I'll get to that in a moment. So for people opening up their wallets or pocketbooks, Americans. who value that relationship and are horrified by the anti-Semitism and the Hamas brigades, right, these hate rallies that we've seen since October 7th, it makes sense to me that they would want to help get Donald Trump elected. I don't see that as a negative at all, even if I might quibble with the exact dollar amount. And it does seem like the people who are very concerned about Jewish money or money going to or allegedly from Israel or A-PAC or whatever. They're awfully silent. about massive foreign influence campaigns of much higher dollar amounts from Qatar, for example. They're unconcerned, unaware, not focused on that. I find that very interesting and very problematic, I think, to the underlying point that they're trying to make. Then the next part was during the summer against Iran, Even though he advised against it, Israel still attacked Iran and the U.S. still bombed on behalf of Israel. So many things that are wrong with that. President Trump knew in advance exactly what Israel was going to do. That was clear from moment one. There was no daylight between the U.S. and Israel once that 12-day war started. Israel was masterful. in their ability to take out top Iranian officials, military officials, nuclear scientists, etc. Israel dominated Iran's own airspace almost immediately. Israel attacked Iran from within Iranian territory. That is how penetrated the Iranian regime was. The Iranian regime, by the way, that is a death to America regime. They chant it Friday prayers for years, death to America, and they mean it. Iran has facilitated the death of many Americans through their proxies, like Hezbollah, in Iraq, bombings and threats and assassination plots all around the world. The fact that Israel has many of our same enemies, the fact that we share many enemies with Israel.

underscores the importance of our alliance with Israel. Iran hates us and Iran hates Israel. That is not a strike against Israel in my book. So Israel had this very successful, brief, devastating war against Iran. Iran had directly attacked Israel and, of course, indirectly attacked Israel multiple times, including through its proxy on October 7th, Hamas. And then the United States made the decision. Donald Trump, the president, the commander-in-chief, made the decision not to, quote, bomb on behalf of Israel. He bombed to cripple Iran's nuclear program, which is a promise that American presidents of both parties, including Trump, have been making for decades. Trump was the one who actually did it. He saw the opportunity. The airspace was clear, thanks to the Israelis, by the way. The Iranians were basically naked. We knew where these facilities were. We had unique ability with the bunker busters to take him out and to cripple the program. And Trump made that decision not for Israel, although there are many Americans, of course, living in Israel. Dozens of Americans were killed and kidnapped on October 7th. But he did this because Iran's nuclear program is a threat to us in addition to other countries, one of which is Israel. The death to America regime, the number one state sponsor of terrorism in the world, getting nuclear weapons is a giant threat to global security and to the United States of America and to the people of America. And President Trump had the wherewithal. The perfect opportunity and the stones, quite candidly, to go do something that presidents had talked about for years, and he did it for us, on behalf of us. This was his vision, not on behalf of Israel. That is a flawed premise. Yes, Trump has had frustrations with Benjamin Netanyahu. Many world leaders have. Many Israeli leaders have. But the fact that we have this alliance... and interests that align, including fighting mutual enemies, some frustrations. Trump will use colorful language and get angry at all sorts of people, including people within his own party. Domestically, the idea that him getting frustrated with Benjamin Netanyahu is somehow proof that he was done with Benjamin Netanyahu, but someone still pulling the strings, and he kept doing things anyway for Israel. That is conspiratorial nonsense. The questioner said, Israel has not been a great ally to the U.S. that mentioned the 1960s when they bombed the USS Liberty. Absolute red herring. That was in the 67 defensive war by the Israelis, by the way, one of three existential defensive wars where all the surrounding countries, or nearly all of them, got together to try to wipe Israel off the map. One of them was right after Israel was established in the 40s, the late 40s. One of them was in 1967, this conflict that just came up. Then one was in 1973. Then there were others along the way. Of course, October 7 happened two years ago. But this was an example of friendly fire, which happens in war. Decades and decades ago. Decades before this kid was alive, probably before this kid's parents were alive.

The Israelis accidentally fired on one of our ships. During a war for their own survival, they thought it was an enemy ship. Communications were not as good back then. They made a mistake. They admitted. They apologized. They offered restitution to the victims. It was a mistake. Friendly fire. It happens, unfortunately. Famous examples in war, you think about the Vietnam War, help. Afghanistan, Iraq. Tragically, these things happen. It was not hidden or covered up. It was admitted and apologized for, and we have remained committed allies with them, and it's flowed both ways ever since. Going all the way back to the late 60s and saying, oh, this terrible mistake was made to the USS Liberty, look, the Israelis secretly are trying to kill Americans. I mean, it's just... one out-of-context example that is used against Israel, in this case to try to make it seem like Israel is such a bad ally to the U.S., which is garbage. Because we share a bunch of these enemies, the Israelis are vital allies to us. Yes, militarily, also on intelligence. You think about what Israel pulled off against Hezbollah, with the Pager operation taking out Nasrallah, their leader. Hezbollah has the blood of hundreds of Americans on its hands. And the Israelis decapitated that leadership. The Israelis just decapitated Houthi leadership as well in some strikes recently. The Houthis have been taking shots at us, at our people. We share that common enemy, several common enemies. And Israel does a hell of a lot of dirty work in that region against our shared enemies, so we don't have to. Americans were not involved in the Hezbollah operation at all. Americans were not on the ground in Iran. Americans have not been on the ground in Gaza, except for that disaster with the pier, the pier off the coast from Biden, which was a total pander, complete failure, huge waste of money, even loss of life. The Israelis do a lot for us. They take out the trash repeatedly, including trash, terrorists, that want not just the Jewish state eliminated and Jews dead, but also Americans dead. The great Satan, death to America. They keep us out of a number of conflicts because they are so good at what they do. With our help, it is mutually beneficial. The idea that they're a bad ally, especially when you can, I mean, my goodness, go around the world, talk about some bad allies or some inconsistent or two-faced allies. The list is very long of those. But to jump and... seemingly put Israel at the top of that list, I think, is total nonsense. Whether it's misinformed or malicious, I don't know. Then we got this thing. Israel's a nation where Christians are constantly under attack in both Gaza and the West Bank. What on earth does that mean? Gaza and the West Bank aren't Israel. Those are the Palestinian territories. To the extent that Christians are constantly under attack in those places, that wouldn't be by the Jews, dude.

That would be from the people who live those places, the Palestinians, with Hamas until recently controlling Gaza. In the war that just happened, there have occasionally been reports about Christians under threat or churches being hit. Things happen in urban warfare that no one wants. But the idea that Israel is constantly attacking Christians is crazy. It is absolutely false. Go there. I've been there multiple times as a Christian, attended church, been welcomed with open arms as Israel does to thousands and thousands of Christian tourists and people on religious pilgrimages every single year. The Christians don't go to Gaza for good reason, but that's not Israel. Another huge flaw in the question. So the final point that he makes is, oh, we talk about America first and defending Christians. How can we do this if we align ourselves with the nation that does not do that itself? Israel defends Christians. Israel defends Muslims. There's a huge Arab population inside Israel. It is a pluralistic, tolerant society. Some of these people, I think, would really benefit from learning just a few things about Israel. And certainly, by all means, go there. See it for yourself as I have. America first in my mind is putting America's interests first. Our policy with Israel is, I think, morally correct. I support the Jewish state. I am a Zionist in that sense, unapologetically, happily. But it is first and foremost in America's interests. It is America first to support Israel for the reasons that I've just laid out. It is America first to have a strong ally in that region with a strong military and excellent intelligence services doing a lot of the dirty work that has to be done on behalf of civilization and being on the front lines with their guns and their people and their boots on the ground, defending this outpost of Western civilization, and frankly killing a lot of the people who want to kill us. That is very America first. As President Trump, thank God understands. And I really hope that questions like we heard at Auburn at a turning point event, I hope that the people who applaud a question like that can be educated about how, sorry, very ignorant at best the question was. So I wanted to use my platform to go piece by piece and counter it. More of Guy Benson coming up. New talk for a new generation, Guy Benson. Even if you're using topical prescription creams for your child's eczema, you still might be hearing this. That relentless itching that makes them want to scratch and scratch and scratch and scratch. When they're moderate to severe eczema isn't well controlled, it's time to ask about DuPixant, dipylamab, which isn't a cream, steroid, or immunosuppressant. DuPixant helps kids as young as six months stay ahead of their eczema, with clearer skin and noticeably less itch. Severe allergic reactions, including skin reactions, can occur. Get help right away for face, mouth, tongue, or throat swelling, wheezing, or trouble breathing.

Tell your doctor right away of new or worsening eye problems like eye pain or vision changes, skin symptoms, joint aches in pain, or a parasitic infection. Don't change or stop other treatments without talking to your doctor. DuPixant helps your child feel the heal. Ask your child's eczema specialist. Visit duPixent.com or call 1844 DuPixent. I'm Guy Benson. We are back. Thanks for listening. There's a new twist today in the Epstein saga. Emails revealed by House Oversight Committee Democrats sent back in 2011 between Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. And Epstein, apparently, if this is confirmed and authentic, in April of 2011, emailed this to Maxwell, quote, I want you to realize that the dog that hasn't barked is Trump. Victim, redacted, spent hours at my house with him, presumably meaning Trump. He has never once been mentioned, police chief, etc. I'm 75% there. Not exactly sure what some of that means at the end. But the other implications could be concerning. Maxwell writes back, I have been thinking about that. Dot, dot, dot, dot. There are some other emails involving a journalist of dubious credibility who's a known fabulous. So I'm going to leave those off to the side. But this exchange from 2011 at least might suggest that President Trump was spending a good amount of time with someone that Democrats claim is a victim of Jeffrey Epstein, which would conceivably implicate Trump in all of this. Now, I don't automatically trust the Democrats, obviously. They're partisans. They've been obsessed with this only when there was a Trump angle. That journalist that I mentioned also, I do not trust. What Republicans are saying on the Oversight Committee is the redacted name of this alleged victim is actually publicly known already. And it's a woman who has said apparently now publicly that she personally never witnessed any wrongdoing by President Trump on this. So if that's the case, that would at least, to me, puncture and take some of the air out of what the Democrats are now hyping about this new information. I don't know. I do think that this underscores the notion that to the greatest extent possible has to be done thoughtfully and carefully and protect victims and all of that. That's important. But I do think getting as much of this out there with the files as possible is important for transparency and accountability. Otherwise, you'll get little drip drips like this, cherry-picked potentially out of context, potentially contradicted elsewhere, and it just goes on and on. Get the information out there, do it in a responsible way, and let people make up their minds. That's the update today. I wanted to bring it to your attention. because it's going wild online, as you might imagine. We'll be right back with Josh Holmes after this. Cheers to America's 250th birthday. Get 20% off your first purchase at Fox Newswineshop.com with code FM Radio 20. 20% discount excludes wine club offers and cannot be combined with any other promotion. Expires July 31st, 2026. Must be 21 order to order. Please drink responsibly.

Guy Benson, sponsored by Previgin. Previgin, made for your brain. Halfway through the broadcast week on this Wednesday, it's Guy Benson. It's halftime on the program as well. So glad that you're listening. Appreciate your listenership every single day. Guy Benson.com is our online home where the podcast is free of charge and on demand every single day. Joining us now is Josh Holmes, founding partner at Cavalry LLC and co-hosts of the ruthless variety program available wherever you get your podcasts. Josh, always good to have you here. Great to be here, Guy. How are you doing? I am doing well. I want to talk about the government shutdown that seems to be finally winding down because just enough Democrats have given up this insane, pointless exercise in nihilism. This is where it was always going to end with something of a whimper for the Democrats resulting in fury among the base that was, I guess, convinced that this would be somehow fruitful for them. We've all seen this movie before, often in stark relief in a painful way when Republicans have tried this in the past, ending predictably, and now it's happening on the other side, and it's like they never paid attention to how these things worked, even not that long ago. Yeah, I mean, look, it's indicative of a larger issue that Democrats have going on right now, which is an utter lack of leadership and a leadership, furthermore, that is becoming increasingly beholden to this. violent, extreme, ideologically, you know, wild part of their party that is sort of dragging them around by the tie everywhere that they go. And Chuck Schumer, of course, back in March, this very same bill that they just passed, understood that they had to keep the lights on in the government and passed it and immediately calls for his resignation. And so... You know, his lesson learned from that was not that you have to do the right thing and keep the American people in a decent spot vis-a-vis the federal government. It was to basically just cut and run and try to pretend as though he was some kind of ideological crusader who was out with no strategy in mind but wanted to shut down the government because he had to show fight. And so, like, look, none of it had anything to do with. Obamacare subsidies or anything out. They had a list of four items, which, by the way, included refunding the public broadcasting system, none of which came to fruition, of course, because it was never practical to do at all. But, you know, at the end of the day, Chuck Schumer is trying to get to a point where he's placating this far left in an effort to keep his job. And he ultimately voted no.

on the bill to reopen government, and that was not taken kindly by the people he was trying to impress, because they understood, and this is what's so strange to me, they know enough about the game. to understand that that was just empty posturing where he had other people walk the plank who are retiring or not up for re-election anytime soon. All right. You eight can go and do this. We'll reopen the government. I'll be over here voting no, so I can rage about this and pretend that I'm against it. And then we'll all just move on. And they're like, no, we see right through that. We know exactly what you're doing. We are not impressed. We still hate you, Chuck. Those exact same people who are. seeing through the charade are also, I guess, laboring simultaneously under the delusion that they were going to win this in some sort of substantive way. Why? Is it just because they feel like the media is on their side so the rules are completely different for them? Because the media is on their side, and the public opinion polls, I think, reflected that to an extent. But again, in terms of outcomes, governing outcomes, were they deluding themselves? This time would be different because they're different or they're better or what? Yeah, I think so. And look, when you're a party leader, and I don't care if you're a Republican or Democrat, you're not in it to be like. There are certain functions of government that just have to happen, and it's never popular. Things like keeping the lights on in the government or debt ceilings or things like that, that there's no choice, but you have to do at some level. And that is the crux of the problem the party leaders always have. The question is how deftly you handle that. Do you use that? for a piece of leverage that is actually obtainable. You can get something at the base of your party wants to have done. I was a part of a couple of those in the early... 20 teams where we were able to accomplish things like that, or do you let air out of the balloon from those circumstances where you know you're going to have to do and choose to fight another day, preserve some of that political capital for fights that actually matter? And the problem with Chuck Schumer is that now twice in one year he's picked the wrong fight. Right, both times, right? The first time he did the responsible thing, but shocked his people when he did it, and they felt blindsided. And they said, okay, never mind, let's shut the government down for, it'll ultimately be, what, close to 45 days. And then we'll do all of this and still come out empty-handed, which is going to make them and has made them irate on a completely different level now. I just don't understand what he's thinking, which is why I do wonder if his days, and we're seeing these pronouncements about him, that his days are numbered in that position, or maybe even in the U.S. Senate, because it just seems like he's putting his foot wrong constantly.

Well, his days of being an effective leader of that party are absolutely over. I can tell you exactly what they're thinking over there. What they're thinking is they're going to try to keep as low profile as they can unify a partisan force amongst something that all Democrats can be for or against because it won't be until next fall where they have to deal with all this kind of stuff again, and then hope that they win the midterms and miraculously return him to power. The problem is that now he's lost any ability to persuade within his party. The Bayfatham, the center of that electorate is going to think that he has no leadership capability whatsoever because he didn't guide them through anything. He basically hung his own members out to dry and made vulnerable Democrats that much more vulnerable by shutting the government down for 42 days. And so it is over. The question is when? And I would be surprised if anything happened before the midterms. You know, whether he runs again or not, if he is there in January of 2027, it will be in such a diminished capacity. It's almost not even worth talking about. And related to that, Josh, I mean, you had Dick Durbin. So for a long time, the number two Democrat in the U.S. Senate, he's retiring. We played the sound of him yesterday saying, yeah, I also hate the Trump administration, but this isn't the way to do it. We shouldn't just indefinitely shut down the government and take away people's paychecks and their ability to feed their kids. That was a senior Democratic leader explaining why he was ending the Democrats' own shutdown, which was such. a stinging rebuke of what the Democrats have been up to for more than a month. And then at the same time, they've been saying, well, no, it's not our shutdown. It's the Republican shutdown. But when Republicans have been voting over and over again to reopen the government, then finally just enough Senate Democrats join them to end the filibuster, the people went from saying it's the GOP shutdown to, how dare these backstabbers ruin our shutdown? It's been totally incoherent. It's the word I keep using. One of my favorite perennial exercises in Washington, D.C., is that of the retiring Democrat, which all of a sudden, because their skin is no longer in the game, have to acknowledge that the sky is blue. In this case, Dick Durbin is like, yeah, well, I spent my entire career arguing the government shutdowns are bad, so it's very difficult for me to do that now. And because I don't care electorally within my party, I'm just going to tell you what it is that's happening here. And that's basically what he did. I mean, you remember like John Tester last cycle was like, yeah, I'm not really that wild about dudes and women's locker rooms, except up to that point he was totally on board for it. So it really is just sort of this perennial thing within the Democratic Party, but it's boiling over now, Guy. And I think you can see what's happening is both an ideological war within the Democratic Party and also a generational war. We've got a whole bunch of young folks. within the party that want this wholesale change. And honestly, it's going to be a battle royale for these people over the next year. Do you think it will matter? Because part of me thinks the chaos that ensues is going to be very, very messy.

You'll probably end up with a lot more radical and extreme left-wing Democrats. They're all excited about that part of the movement in the party, right? That's where all the energy is, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Zohran Mamdani, Bernie, et cetera. And if that's the case, I think that those are at least theoretically less electable Democrats. But we've also seen when the winds start blowing in this country and they can change quickly, when that breeze comes through, sometimes a pretty stiff one. A lot of crazy can get elected. So I'm just not sure that Republicans can sit back and say, oh, well, they're going to go down such a radical path that they're going to be finished and voters won't go for it. Maybe, but maybe not, right? That's part of my fear here. No, you're entirely right. You can't rest on your laurels. I mean, crazy things have happened. Did you think 25 years removed from 9-11 that you'd have a, you know, radical Islamist that is taking out the mayor of New York City? Of course not. But that is what's happened. And so, you know, you've got a campaign as hard against these folks as you do against any, and there's a lot more energy here in this version of the Democratic Party. I will say, though, I'd rather, from a congressional standpoint, I'd rather deal with an honest socialist. than somebody like Chuck Schumer. Because, look, they have goals and their end goal is the same as the Republican Party. They just have a wildly different way of achieving it. And you can sometimes figure out whether there are things of mutual interest. Somebody like Chuck Schumer, all he's doing is trying to mirror back. stuff that he does not believe in, but trying to sit on top of a party that he no longer leaves. And so what he tells you one day is entirely different than the next. And I think that is the hallmark of today's establishment Democrat. And it is incredibly difficult to do business with. Well, and part of the, I think, frightening. stew that's involved here it's not just his weakness and his duplicity and the factlessness all of that is true and i think he's turned off a lot of people but it's also just i think manifestly obvious josh that to some extent the base and the young left wingers don't like Chuck Schumer because of what he is and they would call that a zionist But I think that's a big part of it. They don't want that leading their party anymore. And he can't do anything. to satisfy them on that front. And I think that is a disturbing element. Whatever you think of the Democratic Party, I don't like seeing that side to it, but I think it's undeniable. And there are some strains of that, as we've talked about recently here on the right, as well. Josh Holmes, I'm up on a break, but when we come back, a really important piece of in the weeds political analysis that you've offered recently.

that is heavily related to the government shutdown and an internal debate among Republicans. I want to give you the floor and let you educate me and the audience on something that I think is a bit arcane but still really important. That's next with Josh Holmes on Guy Benson. Stay tuned. In the swamp, not of the swamp. Guy Benson. We're back with Josh Holmes on Guy Benson, just walked through the Democratic battle, maybe the civil war within that party after this government shutdown, which is now petering out. There's a related story, Josh, that you've been tweeting about. I've talked about it here. I talked to a lot of Republican senators about it as well over the course of this long Democrat Chuck Schumer shutdown. It's the filibuster question where President Trump was saying Republicans need to get smart and get tough and get rid of the filibuster. They can reopen the government. with a simple majority, there's already a bipartisan majority for this clean CR, just reform the filibuster or get rid of it or whatever because the Democrats are going to do it anyway, so we might as well do it first. I thought that was short-sighted and... dangerous and really bad advice. Trump had offered it in his first term as well, and luckily in my mind, fortunately, Senate Republicans rejected it. And by the way, a bunch of Democrats did too, saying, we must protect the filibuster and minority rights from Trump's predations. And then many of them did, in fact, flip immediately, hypocritically into an anti-filibuster position when it benefited them. My question for you, as someone who is on the inside of this and really understands how the Senate works and the value of minority rights and institutionalism. What is the case to conservatives in favor of keeping the filibuster intact? And what do you say to people who make the prediction that Democrats have become so radical that they are going to get rid of it next time they're back in charge? So what's the point of being principled when they're already telling us that they are not? What do you say to that? Yeah, I don't think it's anything to do with being principled one way or another, although I will say I am sort of partisan to principle myself. But I think this is one of those arcane issues he actually need to be educated upon in terms of how it benefits your partisan point of view before you weigh in one way or another. I mean, if you look at the two political parties in America, America, Republicans, by and large, they like this country. They like the Constitution. They like the infrastructure, the capitalism, the components that make America America, the idea that you can. grow up in one lot in life and find yourself at the end of it in a very another. And so what that lends itself is to modest changes around the edges, try to prove economic output to better secure the people of your country. Many of those things, if not most of those things, are accomplished through a process called reconciliation that has nothing to do with the filibuster, right? We saw that with a big, beautiful bill. Almost all of the Trump administration's agenda was able to be accomplished through that. Conversely, on the other side, the Democratic Party, they believe that America is fundamentally broken. And what it lends itself to are these massive wholesale changes in America, everything from capitalism itself to adding states to the union, to packing the court, changing the number of justices that are on the Supreme Court.

these massive changes that would fundamentally remake America that they haven't been able to accomplish but for the existence of the filibuster. And, you know, having spent time in the Senate during the Obama years, I can tell you, without the filibuster, you would not recognize your country today. I mean, this was a day in and day out threat. And so to the point that, well, Democrats are going to blow it up and they're going to throw it out if they ever get in charge anyway. Well, that may very well be true. I could concede that. But the last time that they did this, they did this in terms of a judicial filibuster, and they paid a very heavy political price for it. They promptly lost. the congressional elections, they were on the precipice of having a majority, believe it or not, in the Supreme Court. And then within two and a half years, they have a six three minority on the Supreme Court. And they opened up a Pandora's box to their worst nightmares in terms of how Republicans basically took what it is that they did and jammed it right down their throats. And so I think that there is a parallel to that if you're talking about a legislative filibuster. And if Democrats want to do it, they can do it. They're going to pay a very heavy price to do it. But if Republicans do it for them, they pay no price at all. Right. No, they want the Republicans do this for them. So they can say, actually, this dangerous precedent was what Trump and the Republicans did at the behest of Donald Trump. So now we will abuse it because. They did it first, right? The Democrats would love that. John Thune and the Senate Republicans have said, nope, we're not even going down that path, which I think is the sensible approach in all of this. And the one thing I keep bringing up as well. is maybe the Democrats, if they regain a Senate majority down the line, maybe they will blow up the filibuster. So they can, especially if they have the trifecta, they control all of government, they can just wildly swing everything to the left and try to stack the deck, making new states, adding Supreme Court seats, you know, single-payer health care. You'd go down the laundry list. I think they would have a lot of that in mind. And if and when the Republicans then got back in charge, they could. turn this whole thing against them and radically shift things back in the other direction. I really don't think any of that is healthy for the country. But the point I was going to make, Josh, is the Democrats might want to do it, and a lot of them are talking openly and loudly about wanting to do it, fantasizing about it right now. That being said, they might not, right? They might not have the votes ultimately because enough people remember how it blew up in their faces on judges and enough of them might realize that the Republicans could use this in a way that really hurts us down the line. Let's let cooler heads prevail. I would rather allow that possibility to remain in the offing.

Then to preemptively upset the apple cart with the Republicans doing this first. I think that would be a mistake for the reasons that you have laid out. Josh Holmes, on that point, got a run. We always appreciate your time. Check out the Ruthless podcast. Always a lot of fun wherever you get your podcasts. Josh, we'll talk soon. All right. Thanks, Guy. Appreciate being on. Final hour of Guy Benson upcoming. Will Kane stops by for a substantive conversation, a lot to get to with him straight ahead. Raise your glass to Guy Benson Happy Hour. Brought to you by the Finnish Long Drink. Finland's most popular alcoholic beverage is taking America by storm. Visit thelongdrink.com. And now, here's Guy Benson. It's the happy hour here on Guy Benson, our final hour of three on this Wednesday. Delighted to have you along. Thank you for listening. Guy Benson.com. That's our website. Podcast free every day when the show ends in just about an hour. You can get that podcast. No charge at Guy Benson's show.com or Fox Newspodcast.com or wherever you get your podcasts. This hour is sponsored by the Finnish long drink. We love it. We encourage you to enjoy as well. If you are 21 years of age or older, please drink responsibly, the long drink.com. Well, joining us now is Will Kane. Host of Wilcane Country on Fox News.com, noon Eastern Monday to Thursday. You can get that as a podcast as well. Plus, of course, host of the Will Kane Show on Fox News Channel, weekdays 4 p.m. Eastern. I'm scheduled to join later in the week, as a matter of fact. Will, great to have you back. What's up, guy? A lot is up, and I want to get your take on a couple stories at the intersection of politics and sports, which is kind of your comfort zone, I know for sure, your wheelhouse. You spent some time in your career over at ESPN. One of their big, popular personalities is Pat McAfee, who just interviewed yesterday, the president. for Veterans Day and got a lot of backlash about that from people on the left. They were very angry that he would have Trump on. Here he was, Pat, firing back at the critics cut 20. I will like to say, though, for the immediate people that are going to be mad about that happening, as President of the United States, it's Veterans Day. He's Commander-in-Chief. Obviously, if we have the opportunity to talk to him, we're going to, and he is hilarious. Last point is, I just think, empirically correct, Will, but... It does seem a little interesting that people who were, in many cases, in love with Barack Obama and his media strategy, which was being all over the place, on sports broadcasts, on all sorts of different niche podcasts, et cetera, would have very little tolerance for such things when it's a politician that they don't like. And apparently Pat McAfee was just having none of it. He's like, nope, Commander-in-Chief Veterans Day, we're doing it. Get over it. To hell with him.

That's Pat's attitude. That's the right attitude to hell with him. He's the president of the United States. And he is hilarious. Good for Pat for having him on and for everyone that has a problem with it, get over it. And I don't care. No one cares. No one cares what you have to say anymore. I'm tired of your angst. I'm tired of your outrage. ESPN, to the extent that it has an audience that hated something like this, hated hearing from the commander-in-chief, has self-cultivated this audience over time. If you continuously purge voices that might condition an audience into hearing something they disagree with, are hearing something that I believe is a fairly moderate and mainstream point of view in America and teach them that it's nothing but hate and it's nothing but fascism, then that's what you're going to get when you have something as innocuous as the President of the United States yelling hoorah three times on the Pat McAfee Show. They made this bed. Now they lie in it. And to some extent, sports more broadly than ESPN needs to be careful, but they don't continue to make a similar bed. The President of the United States made an appearance on Fox Sports with Kevin Burkhart and Jonathan Vilma during the commanders. game this past Sunday. Yep. And I saw a segment of the audience that thought that was way beyond the pale, but it was absolutely grotesque. But that segment of the audience is always vocal, and I do believe in the minority. So don't make the bed to cater to that small audience, or you'll suffer the same fate. You'll be sleeping in a twin bed, a smaller and smaller audience. that wants to hear your very, very one-sided political point of view and never be exposed to anything as innocuous as the president of the United States. Yeah, and as I mentioned, Barack Obama, the Biden people largely shielded him from a lot of different things, including Super Bowl interviews, which was mind-blowing to me given the opportunity there. But Barack Obama was all over that, and I know some conservatives grumbled about it, but this is what presidents do. And whether you like it or not, it's commander-in-chief. They put him on the NFL broadcast. You mentioned it was commanders in lions. And some people squealed and stomped their feet. I think a lot of other people were like, all right, fine, it's the president. I'm watching the football game, kind of cool that he's there. Then there's other people in the audience who love Trump. And if you're going to cater only to the angry crowd. I think that's a bad business move to begin with, Will, but especially within sports fandom. I know that sports unites a lot of people and sports fans are all across the ideological spectrum, but especially with certain sports, if anything, the fan base is lean right. And if the networks and these sports journalists refuse to see that, I think that's a blindness that's a problem for their business models.

I was more appalled by Jonathan Vilma shoving six, seven jokes into his interview with the president of the United States. On numerous occasions, the analyst for our Fox broadcast, Jonathan Vilma, who I know made a six-seven joke. How many touchdowns did you have as a tight end when you played football, Mr. President? Six, seven? It's like enough. You're talking to the commander-in-chief. It's worn out. I don't want to hear my middle schoolers talk about it. I don't want to hear it on a national broadcast with the commander-in-chief. But... The prospect of expanding your business audience shouldn't only be one for the NFL where you're right, the audience, is probably on average center-right. But I think for a business where they have – if anybody's made the bed of alienating an audience, it would be the NBA. And I don't think the NBA appreciates that. I think they regret that. I think that the NBA would like to bring back an audience and be able to have something similar to the NFL, center-right. There are reports all over the place this week, Will, that the International Olympic Committee is set to ban transgender women from competing in any female Olympic events moving forward based on scientific research, according to these reports, that in fact there are intrinsic and lasting benefits to being born biologically male, which is something that I think is intuitively obvious to almost everyone. But I guess they have to point to experts and research to at least somewhat quell the pushback from activists. This is such an easy call in my book, if and when it happens. It just feels like they're already setting the table for crisis PR management, basically, when a small number of really loud people are going to go berserk over this. I want to know who these team of researchers and scientists were that have been spending years studying the differences between male and female. And have finally come back with conclusive evidence that men have a physical advantage over females in virtually every single athletic discipline. I would like to know the researchers got paid to conduct that research. And here's another question. Can I get some of that money? Because I reached the same conclusion. Were those American scientists? Is the IOC run in America? I'd like to know exactly where those scientists are located because it may be an answer if they are American scientists to another problem, which I have, which is the current debate raging amongst the right, which was President Trump's interview last night with Laura Ingram when he talked about H-1B visas, the idea that we just don't have the skills, we don't have the smart, we don't have the well-educated to fulfill a lot of these jobs, so we've got to bring in Indian and Chinese. highly skilled laborers. Well, if American scientists are busy studying and verifying the difference between male and female athletes, maybe it's true. Maybe we have misallocated resources of our best and our brightest. What did you make of that answer from Trump, by the way, on H-1Bs? I didn't like it. I didn't like it at all guy. I didn't like that from President Trump. I didn't like the defense this morning from DHS Secretary Christine Ome. And I even, although he usually is the most intellectual and the best. explainer in chief. I didn't totally love it from Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Fox and Friends. I actually agree with Vice President JD Vance. I don't accept the argument that Americans aren't smart enough, that Americans aren't talented enough, that Americans can't do these jobs.

71% of H-1B visas. There's 400,000 of which are issued every year. There's a population of 700,000 H-1B visa holders in America come from India. 16% come from China. President Trump also made the argument. We need to continue to bring in Chinese students. in order to support the financial prospects of American universities. And I don't love any of that guy. Yeah, especially, and by the way, just to jump in, I see the case for H-1B visas to an extent. And I think if we can brain drain other countries and have best and brightest here, I think that there is something to be said for that in the United States. I'm not sure about just like throwing the Bill Gates wide open for... Chinese students into universities, given what we know the CCP is up to. That's a bit of a head scratcher to me. And why is President Trump, of all people, like going to bat for the, what, the financial well-being of some of these left-wing institutions that are doing a horrible job, and by the way, also hate him? Also, probably the biggest scam going in America. You know, the last couple of days on the right, the biggest debate has been sort of a... Ben Shapiro versus Tucker Carlson debate about what is the systemic disadvantage of Americans and how much can your current conditions in life be blamed on your individual choices versus a broken system? I tend to fall a little more on you are the product of your choices, but I don't deny the existence of broken systems. And there is no better example than if American universities charging somewhere between $30,000 and $80,000 a year are not producing enough highly skilled laborers in America to fit our demand, then they are a fraud. They are a scam, and they should be prosecuted as such as a fraud. I have trouble reconciling the fact that also, by the way, Chinese students need to come over here to be educated to then, in turn, flip those student visas into H-1B visas taking our most highly skilled labor jobs. I have trouble connecting all of these dots. What more, even the best arguments that are made, and I'm not unopened to these ideas, guy, that, no, there might be a labor gap that we actually need to bring in some of the best of the brightest from across the world. I'm open to that, but not to the extent that I hear it being offered for these two reasons, guys. One, we're bringing... purportedly, Koreans or Chinese to come over and teach us how to build submarines, something we taught them to do 30, 40 years ago. So now we need them in turn to come back and train us on how to do something that is a forgotten art in America, forgotten skill, a forgotten science. If that's true, what a failure, what a depletion of the middle class, what an exporting of jobs that now we have to retrain ourselves on something we want to talk the world how to do.

So if that's the case, very, very short-term H-1V visas. I've got to think you can train someone in three to four years. An apprenticeship program or one of your fancy $80,000 degrees from a private school in the university system in America ought to be able to do just that. Maybe we can build our own subs. But on top of that, Silicon Valley, that's America. That's the world's tech hub. So while all of a sudden now can we not hire Americans where we literally led the curve? on technological innovation. Those H-1B visa holders, guy, are primarily in about three or four industries. Tech, healthcare, IT. You know, I think Americans are smart enough to work in all of those industries. You know, Will, I think another part of this larger question about education and what you're saying about higher education, those questions, I think, very important, well taken, need to be part of this debate. I think the issues really start, at least in this country, a lot sooner. than kids matriculating into college, whether from in the United States or from elsewhere in the world. And that's a point that I actually want to bring up based on some new information that we learned just this week. Let's get to that part of the conversation, that piece of it, as soon as we come back. Will Kane, host of the Will Kane Show on Fox News Channel. He's got a lot going on, spending some time with us on this Wednesday on Guy Benson, continuing on the happy hour after this short break. America is listening to Guy Benson. We're back here on Guy Benson. It's the happy hour. Will Kane is our guest. And Will, you were talking about this immigration debate that's now playing out even amongst the right based on a few things that President Trump's been saying recently, including in an interview with Laura Ingram, foreign labor coming into the country, high-skilled and otherwise, then the higher education realm as well, students getting their degrees undergrad. graduate school, et cetera, in the United States and potentially going back to their home countries. These are questions that are being mulled over. There's a point that I wanted to make in addition to that, though, that I think goes to a more serious, fundamental, and core problem that we have right now inside the United States. And I'm talking about the education process and system long before they show up at college. I mean, I'm not sure if you saw that report that came out from UC San Diego, I believe it was, where they had aptitude tests for their incoming freshman class. And there were just staggering levels of incompetence among these kids, these 18, 19-year-old kids. I mean, there were math problems that even I can do, Will. I am far removed from college. I did not in high school. I did not excel at math. I had to work really hard just to get decent grades. That has not come easily to me in my life. Some of these math problems were so easy. I could just do it without batting an eye.

And in some cases, like a quarter of these incoming freshmen couldn't even do those and could not perform up to even close to grade level on writing, for example. I think that we have a failing education system on a much wider scale far beyond starting well before the realm of higher education. I think that is a crisis. And to some extent, maybe an existential crisis in this country. Yeah, I agree. I think we've got real problems in K-12. So here's the question. You think they'll issue student visas to Americans to head over to India and China to get their K-12 education before coming back to America to get their university degrees, or does this relationship only work in one direction? I'm just curious if they're so much better at educating their populace than we are, but yet they have to come here to get their... final polish on education before taking those American jobs. Maybe we should go over there and get our K through 12. Or maybe we should get our K through. I say that facetiously, of course. And I say that without desire. But I just, I'm incredibly frustrated. And, you know, I did this on Wilcane Country the last couple of days, Guy. The digital show, as you mentioned, it's the Wilcane Country YouTube channel. I'm really fascinated by this debate of broken systems versus responsibility and individual. choice. And I'm fascinated by the future of populism and the right. And I think that just from a mental health perspective, yesterday I interviewed Jocko Willink, the former Navy SEAL, author of extreme ownership. And, you know, Jocko's whole thing is extreme ownership of your choice, extreme ownership of your life. Not only does he think it works, but for me, I think it makes me happier. If I lived in a broken system and my choices only had the ability to impact my life 20%, I'd focus on that 20% and not the broken 80% outside my control. Because I feel bad when I'm out of control. I feel good when I have some sense of control. Well, and I also think will. I also think really quickly. Go ahead. I just say there are broken systems, and we're pouring to some right now. The visa program, the immigration system, and education, health care, housing. These are broken systems, and we do need to reform these systems. Yep, I agree on reform, especially with K through 12, get our housing order on that front and a few others as well. I also think people can... take more control of their lives if they want to, instead of sliding back into this more comfortable victimhood area of blaming systems and others. I think you can actually, in some ways, make it a self-fulfilling prophecy by taking ownership. That's not true always, but I think it's often true, and it's something that conservatives have believed for a long time. Will Kane, stand by. We started this conversation. on sports and I want to bring it back to sports but it's not just a sports topic upcoming it very much plays into our culture as well there is a commentary on ESPN again coming back to that network from a pretty well-known analyst

who was asked about a betting scandal that has now affected Major League Baseball. We saw the NBA impacted recently with arrests and the betting and the cheating and the fraud there. This involves some pitchers in Major League Baseball, and this commentator at ESPN offered a take that just kind of stopped me in my tracks, given what sports is supposed to be. And because you and I are both big sports fans, and because, as I said, you were in that world for a while, I want to play you that soundbite, Will, when we come back and then talk about it. Our ongoing conversation here with Will Kane, it's Guy Benson Happy Hour. Please stay with us. A fresh perspective on the topics of the day. It's Guy Benson. We are back. It's the happy hour. It's Guy Benson. Will Kane, our colleague, kind enough to stick around because this is one more topic I wanted to make sure that we got to with you, Will. And it pertains to something that I saw online. It was a clip from TV. And to me, it was this really bizarre exchange on Pardon the Interruption, ESPN show. Michael Wilbon, who I was critical of recently on another subject, was talking about one of these gambling-related scandals in Major League Baseball. Two pitchers for Cleveland, I guess we're intentionally throwing balls in order to... promote some sort of outcome in the gambling world. And Wilbon was talking about it. Here's what he said, cut 19. I'm not going to disagree with anything you said. And if guilty and there's punishment, so be it. I mean, you know the rules. It's explained over and over to you. You're defrauding the game. Yes. And you know what, Tom, I don't care. Really? Because at the highest levels of pyramids in this country, in this culture. Everybody's betting now. It's on every phone except yours and mine. Don't you want it to be honest? Don't you know what? Does that affect the game? Does it tilt it in any way that matters to me? I know what you're going to say, that it's very small and it's not throwing the game. Right. But the more of these things happen, it's water and it's leaking on something. There's a suddenly slope. There's a sudden slope. But you know what? Enough female. Now, you can see Tony Kornheiser jumping in there, sort of astounded like I am. These guys are intentionally doing things against their interests. for betters, basically, in the gambling world. And Will Bond's take is, I don't care. There's all this gambling everywhere, so what? Will, I just, I don't know what to say about that other than if you lose the integrity of sports and fans don't believe that guys are giving it their all or gals in every moment of every game, and they might have these outside interests, I mean, you lose the whole thing in my mind.

I had not heard that clip before you just played it for me, and so I'll leave you with a thought experiment guy. The point by Michael Wilbon is not without some merit. So what you're talking about is prop bets. These pitchers with the Indians were throwing an intentional ball because there's a prop bet on what the first pitch would be when they were on the field, on the mound. One could argue, and I would not argue this, one could argue, well, that's not going to impact the ultimate outcome of the game. He's not throwing it. He's indulging these tiny little prop bets. which was also part of the NBA scandal when guys were betting over-unders on how many minutes someone will play or how many points that they would score. It's not necessarily throwing a game or directly saying, I'm going to make sure this team wins or this team loses. I'm not justifying it. I'm just clarifying exactly what was happening. And I'm clarifying it to tell you this. Wilbon is right. In that, sports is just scratching the surface guy. And I had this conversation with somebody high in sports last night. They said, have you ever been to Kalshi? Go to Cal Sheets, it's a predictive betting market. You can bet on the first words out of Karoline Leavitt's mouth when she holds a White House press briefing. You can bet on how many times she's going to say the word MAGA in the course of a White House press briefing. You can bet on everything now, Guy, and sports is just one part of it, and maybe even the least manipulable. You could manipulate so many things on so many things we are betting on out there in society, all would fall under the umbrella of these. prop bets. I think we're just getting started. This doesn't end with sports. This started in sports. I think that's very well, at least partially true. I just don't understand if your job is to be a sports commentator and there are people who are intentionally doing things against their own team's interests because of a prop bet. And he's saying, well, if they have punishments, you know, fine, then I'm okay with that. I just don't care. I feel like that is a dangerous position to hold because it might be a low-level fraud, but it is still a fraud, and then the temptation gets bigger and bigger and grows and grows to do more things. Maybe throw a couple more pitches out of the strike zone, things that could really then very much impact an inning or the outcome of a game. And it starts with, oh, it's one pitch to start off and at bat. It's not going to impact the game itself. I'm not throwing the game. It's fine. It's not hard at all to envision a slippery slope, sometimes a fallacy, sometimes not, where all of this infect sports more broadly and the very integrity of these games itself blows up. And then I feel like you are killing the actual game itself and sacrificing it on the altar of this gambling apparatus that has been built up all around it. I think it's just really dangerous and makes me feel... Just kind of sick as a fan. I'm not a gambler. I don't care. All the thing is, I totally agree, Guy. And you can't get moral absolution by pointing to a potentially bigger moral problem. What I'm telling you is, brace yourself. Because there is so much more you're going to wonder about the integrity of when everything in our world can be bet upon. I don't think that excuses sports. I think you should hold the position that you actually have. And I think you should buckle up because get ready to have this conversation. every single market in our economy, including politics. So do you jump in and start regulating or banning this stuff?

I think you've got to figure that out. Yeah, I think, I mean, prop betting doesn't serve any real gaming purpose in my mind. I mean, it's not the same thing as playing blackjack. It's not the same thing as a roulette wheel. Somebody said to me last night, guy, remember the scene in vacation. I don't actually remember the scene very well, but Chevy Chase is making his way from table to table, making increasingly speculative and ridiculous bets. And he finally gets to a point in the casino where he's standing before a guy, and the guy's like, what number am I thinking of? And you can bet on what number he's thinking of. This is the world we're headed for. Yeah, I don't think that's a good place. And I think being very nonchalant about it, I'm not saying you are, but I think Wilbon was fairly nonchalant about it, saying I don't really care. I do. As a sports fan, and I know you're making the point well beyond just the world of sports into other corners, maybe every corner of our society, I don't think that is a healthy... development that's my my final point in all of this will cane you can catch a show on youtube will cane country then he's got the 4 p.m eastern time show just came off the air there fox news channel every weekday will always appreciate your time your thoughtfulness see you on the tv side soon Thank you, Guy. With that, we'll step aside. We'll come right back. More of Guy Benson happy hour. Up next with the home stretch, some self-care, some bathing trends that have been brought to my attention by Christine. God help us. I guess we'll talk about them next. Always fresh. Always fair. Guy Benson.

And now it's time for your favorite segment of the day. Home Stretch. It's basically the only segment I'm on. So I've declared it the audience's favorite segment. Guy Benson. Home Stretch. Wednesday edition, Guy Benson.com, the website, podcast, always free. So we were talking about a few different topics for today's home stretch, one or two of which we might get to tomorrow or later in the week. And then the general subject of bathing came up. Producer Christine had seen something about a trend. And somehow I've been persuaded to talk about this. Christine, what is dark showering and why are we supposed to care about this? So dark showering is exactly what you think it is. It is taking a shower completely in the dark, but... at night before you go to bed because it's supposed to lower your anxiety. It's supposed to put you in a more relaxing and calm mood and then get ready so you can have a much better sleep, which I think I need. Do you go to bed right after you shower typically? Are you a nighttime shower? No, no. I'm a morning shower. So this is going to be, I'm going to try to do this. I'm going to try to do it for 10 days to see if, you know, If my sleep improves. Let's just start with this. Have you stopped having the TV on as you try to sleep? No. No, I have the TV on every single night. Christine, Christine, stop looking for new trends to help your sleep when you have the television on in your room. Well, maybe I'll be so calm and not anxiety-ridden that I'll just turn the TV off. I don't know my voice is correct. I'll just turn the TV off right when I get out of the shower and go to bed. You can just turn off the television anyway. I can't. It doesn't take a shower. I can't do that. I can't do that. Yes, you can. You take the remote and there's a power button and you push it. Okay, but I don't make me say it again on air. What? I'm a little afraid at the dark. Well, you can have like a little white noise machine that maybe has a little glow. They make those. So a little tiny glow like a nightlight, little white noise, so much better for you than the television. Because the TV, is there any volume on? Oh, yeah. The Golden Girls play all night. Oh, Christine. Yeah, right. From when I go to bed, I put the Golden Girls on like season one or two, so then I know it's going to go through the whole entire night. This is why you can't sleep properly. It has nothing to do with dark showering or a need. Yes, you have to change your nighttime routine. It has nothing to do with falling warm water. It has to do with your television blaring in your bedroom all night long. Justin and Dylan, you don't sleep with your TV on all night? No. Hannah, I actually got to convert to having the TV off. Like she slept with it on all night? Her entire life. And then since we have moved in together, I have shut that down. Does she sleep better? Probably not to be fair. Well, I'm... How's that possible? Wait, so you just go to bed, like you just turn the lights out, put your head on the pillow, and just go to sleep in the pitch black, dark. Yeah. What? Yeah. We have a white noise machine.

That helps. I like that. When I travel, I have a white noise machine on my phone. And that's like a little bit of background noise. It sounds like the interior of like a jumbo jet. Like if you're on a flight, like the that's what it sounds like. It's not that loud. That's soothing to me. But I want it, yeah, dark. Dark at night to sleep. So why would you do dark showering if there's not a value to darkness? Oh, I didn't even think of it that way. Well, I think it's the water aspect that, you know, and I, to be perfectly honest, I wouldn't completely shower in the dark. I might light, like, a tea candle or a regular candle because, like, I told you, I'm kind of scared of the dark. We're missing the big picture here. What? If you shower in the dark, the odds of you making it out of that shower safely. That's right. Are less than 10%. No, you're going down. What do you mean? You're falling. Oh, you think I'd fall? Yes. Oh, yeah. I'm not like an, I'm not an elderly lady. You're not? Oh, wow. You need a life alert is what you would need. The necklace? Yeah, down you go. I've fallen and I can't get up. It's like, oh, the people at the headquarters are like, it's cookie again. It's the dark shower. Yeah, that's why I'd have a little light on. But Dylan, have you heard about dark showering? I've not heard about dark showering. There's one other shower-related trend I've heard of lately, but not dark showering now. That was very vague. Would you like to share with the class? Yeah, I mean, I can. Have you guys ever heard of shower orange? Pardon me? What? Yeah, so this is a trend? Like the color? No, like the fruit. Um, so there's a whole community of people online actually dedicated to shower orange, but basically I came across shower orange with my friends in college. And basically what it is is you take a shower and while you're in the shower, you eat an orange. Why? That's, I mean, that's it. Well. I mean, I think they say it's like, it's supposed to be primal or something. Like, you just like... What? It sounds so ridiculous now that I'm explaining it. Is it not just like vitamins? Like, hey, you can eat an orange. It's just like Christine. Like, you can just turn off the television before you get into bed. You could just eat an orange at your kitchen table. Well, you could. You could just eat an orange or... You could feel like maybe you're like a caveman or something. No, you know, it's about the sandwich. So you're eating it like in a messy way? Like you're just like. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like letting it drip all over. You're like, oh, me eat orange. Yeah. Yeah, no, that's actually exactly what you do. You just kind of rip into it. Yeah. I've had.

I've had probably more than a dozen shower oranges over the years. I don't even know if I've had that many shower beers. Oh, boy. That I've heard of. Christine, I'm not surprised that you've indulged in shower beers. Could you do a dark shower orange combo? Or would that just open up a whole other like series of risks to your personal well-being? So dark shower with an orange. And a beer. No, you just added the beer. No one was talking about beers. You've said it twice now. There's no beer in any of this. Yeah, I'll do it all. I mean, that's fine. Yeah, sure. Why not? So you're going to do, you said what, 10 days of dark showering, light a candle. Did I say 10 days? I think you did. I think that was just moments ago. You know, that seems aggressive. How about two? You're going to light a candle in your dark shower and eat an orange and have a beer? Well, I don't think I'd have the beer before bed, maybe a glass of red wine. In the shower? Yeah, that would be hard. I'd have to do it in like a sippy cup of some sort. You're just decreasing the odds of you making out of the shower safety. We're just getting worse and worse. We're just going to stick with the dark shower. I'll report back. I don't think I want the orange. Yeah, the orange, that was one of the weird takes. Does it have to be an orange? What about grapefruit? I mean, I suppose it could be a grapefruit. I guess it could be any fruit you really want. A lemon. I eat lemons. You can eat a lemon. What? You're like eating the bath water as you do this. Eat it lemons? Yes. Like straight up just eating like munching on a lemon? Yes. This is gone completely off the rails. Wait, you never had a lemon? I've, like, had a lemon in my life, but I don't take a gnaw out of a lemon. I feel like we've buried the lead, and we've finally gotten to another freak. Like, I was ready to hand the freak card to Dylan for this homestretch, and then cookie jumps, and she's like, oh, let me one up you. I've got another citrus I want to eat. Hold my shower beer. Hold my lufa. Hold my lufa. I'm going to chow down on a lemon. In the shower, in the dark with a candle in my sippy cup of chardonnay. Oh, my goodness. I thought I was a weird shower person because I often take two a day. But now I feel totally vindicated like a full-blown normal human being because I don't bring outside things into the shower with me. I also shower with lights on. I like it to be illuminated so I can properly bathe and then get out, dry off, and then if it's bedtime, get into bed, turn off all the lights, and sleep. No?

No, I can't. I mean, if you can explain to me how to stop being afraid of the dark, then by all means, I will try it. How about the nightlight? I literally suggested that. I believe about eight minutes ago, and she just blew right past it. It's like I didn't even mention the nightlight. The glowing white noise machine, Christine, it gives you a little sound that's consistent because the problem with the TV screen is it's constantly flashing because the camera cuts and then it's new lighting. Yes, yes. That wakes me up. Distracting. Oh, yeah. You're helping make my point. And then sometimes whatever show is on, it gets into my dreams, you know, and like messes my dreams up a little bit. There's such an obvious, and once again, I'm being your unlicensed, uncompensated therapist here who will be yet again ignored. You can have a consistent low-level glow of a light and a consistent low-level sound that will help you sleep so much better than the golden girls squawking at you for eight hours. you're welcome although you're just going to ignore me yeah so you know enjoy your lack of sleep enjoy your beer in the shower and all the things that are coming and we will perhaps come back to this subject i cannot believe where this segment went Even I. I am shocked by today's home stretch. Thank God it's over, though. I can't take any more of this. Got to go back here tomorrow. Guy Benson's show. Have a great night. I'm a little afraid at the dark. You've never had a lemon? I'm not an elderly lady. You're not. You need a life alert is what you would need. Oh, me eat orange rock. This has gone completely off the rails.

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