DeSantis launches campaign, breaks Twitter in the process

From high atop Fox News headquarters in New York City, always seeking solutions, never sowing division. It's Brian Killmead.

Alright, boy, welcome to the latest moments of the Brian Killmead Show.

So glad you're here. We're going to have a Josh Cross hour from Axios at the bottom of the hour.

So that'll be great. And we'll get his insight on the On the widening field of GOP candidates, we'll also take your calls at 1-866-408-7669. Kind of an eventful night last night for. Governor DeSantis, one he'll never forget, and one that Donald Trump loved. I'll let you know why.

And by the way, today, Secretary of Defense Austin and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Milley, who's been a disaster, will have a conference on Ukraine because there's a lot of developments there, which brings me to the big three.

Now with the stories you need to know, it's Brian's big three. Number three. We've been pretty darn clear that we don't support the use of U. S. made equipment used for attacks inside Russia.

We've been clear about that with the Ukrainians. John Kirby, Ukraine, things are changing. It looks like Ukraine might be attacking inside Russia, and the Wagner Group is predicting a Russia collapse as they essentially admit this war was a mistake and they are about to lose. Number Tim, we've offered a lot of concessions. The cap on the spending is a Democrat idea.

The work requirement was a Democrat idea. I can't help it if the Democrats have become so extreme and now as a party of Bernie Sanders. Yup, Kevin McCarthy, not shy about the press, letting his perspective get out, unlike the president. With the debt default just days away, where does Joe go? The Oval, the East Room?

Try Camp David, then Rehoboth to visit his Corvette and his classified documents. Is this why he cut his crucial trip short?

So far, Kevin McCarthy is controlling the narrative. Number one. I pledge to you that on January 20th, 2025, at high noon, that I'll be the guy on the west side of the Capitol with the left hand on the Bible and the right hand in the air taking the oath of office as the 47th President of the United States. No more excuses. Here we go.

Game on. Ron finally runs. DeSantis is officially in, and two things are clear: he's got a gap to close versus Trump, and Twitter Spaces needs a lot of work because it crashed Elon Musk. What it means for the overall race, and why does Governor DeSantis beat Biden head-to-head in almost every poll, and Trump does it, both within the margin of error.

So let's talk about this. We know that he was supposed to go to 6 o'clock Eastern Time with this thing called Twitter Spaces, bizarrely just audio. I guess people use it in conference calls or chats. I don't know. It makes no sense not to have an audio version of it, but a video version of it.

But it didn't get up for a half hour delayed. There were about 500,000 to 1 million, so it's not a huge audience. Don't know what went wrong, but the fact that Elon Musk was involved in it and was supposed to be doing the interview and it didn't work, I don't know how you blame Ron DeSantis. It's just one of those things where you are ultimately in charge.

So if you're having a wedding and you book the hall and the hall evidently doesn't have air conditioning the day of the wedding, technically you. You booked it, you're in charge, but it's really the hall's fault.

So, DeSantis did do a good interview with Trey Gowdy where he went through his policy positions, non-contentious, and he's officially in from here on in. And first stop is going to be Iowa. He's going to announce his schedule. He's got plenty of money, had a donors' meeting. He's got a good message.

The question is: why is he trailing by 25 points? Why did he lose 10 from February till now? My answer: it doesn't really matter. Whatever happened prior to happened prior.

Now it's a time for him to decide his strategy. It's no longer.

Okay not to answer Donald Trump? Time to open up both barrels if you're Trump. And I think it's fascinating that Donald Trump only attacks one person. And the fact is, the White House only attacked one person. He always attacked Trump, but mostly it's DeSantis.

Didn't go after Tim Scott, didn't go after Nikki Haley, didn't go after Aiden Hutchinson, didn't go after Vivek Ramaswamy. Not sure if they're going to go after Christie. Why?

Something about DeSantis has both sides. Freaked out. Cut one. There is no substitute for victory. We must end the culture of losing that has infected the Republican Party in recent years.

The tired dogmas of the past are inadequate for a vibrant future. We must look forward. Not backwards. We need the courage to lead, and we must have the strength to win. All right, a little staccato, but he's reading a speech.

That was the format. For people who say, why did he read?

Well, it's because it's the speech.

So if you're doing a radio address, FDR would read before there was television.

So He was reading the address and then he had a conversation and then it kept falling out.

So, no one's really going to remember this in a few weeks. Donald Trump had interesting posts. He said, I'd like to personally congratulate Rob. desanctimonious Rob. Hm.

On finally announcing that he will be entering the race for president Of the United States. Hopefully, he'll get the full experience of being attacked by the Marxist, Communists and radical left lunatics of our country, without which he will never know the kind of job he is doing. These lowlifes and misfits are far more than leaders of hostile foreign countries. They must soundly be defeated in order to make America great again. And then he said, Rob, my red button is bigger and stronger and is working, truth.

Yours does not, per my conversation with Kim Jung un of North Korea, soon to become my friend. Afterwards, some of the responses were: Matthew Brodsky said, a political strategist and senior fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy tweeted saying that that is bonkers. DeSantis has been talking about detailed substantive policy issues for the last hour. This is what you get from Trump. If people want idiocy and entertainment, Trump might be the better option.

If you want substance on the right, DeSantis is it. Nobody thinks this is the same. This is sane. They're not afraid to admit it, said David Rebai, a political commentator with the Claremont Institute, which is a conservative college.

So here we go. Game on. I'm not caught up in Donald Trump's 30-point lead. I think he very well could get the nomination. The question is: why is it that DeSantis does better head-to-head with Biden?

Yet he trails. He trails Donald Trump by 30 points. Because Donald Trump has, I guess, higher marks with the Republicans, but if he wasn't in that race, To me, there's no doubt about it. Governor DeSantis could be leading the pack. I do not sleep on Nikki Haley and Tim Scott.

I could definitely see them having their moments and seeing if they could sustain it. But some of the things that happen with DeSantis, he has a six-week ban on abortion after six weeks. People think that that's not good that's going to hurt him in the general. And fighting with Disney, guys, Governor Sunu knew Governor Christie, Donald Trump says you don't fight with corporations. Here's what Ron DeSantis said, cut for.

What ended up happening, though, is that they had this cushy arrangement that they got decades ago where they had their own government in Central Florida. They were exempt from laws that everyone else had to follow, and they got massive tax breaks and even racked up municipal debt.

So what we said was, look, we're not comfortable having this company on a pedestal joined at the hip with the state of Florida. Our values have just gone in different directions. And so we ended their self-governing status. They now have to live under the same laws as everybody else, and they have to pay their fair share of taxes.

So that's the battle going on.

Now, that's not going to benefit him. I think he probably had it out when Iger took over to have an emergency meeting and then see what they could work out, stay out of politics. And if Iger had an attitude and said, I'm going to be more to the left, then you have no choice. That would have been the way I would have done it. But now he's on an ongoing fight, and they're going to use the best lawyers to try to drag this out and make DeSantis look bad.

I actually don't think it hurts him in the primary at all. And then some of the critics just melt away. Because what he's doing is standing up for parents, and he should re-emphasize that. Also, looking at the polls right now. Let's look.

Trump. In February had 43% of the vote, DeSantis had 28%, everybody else in single digits. in march fifty four twenty four So he picked up 11 points. And uh to 24% for DeSantis, and then in April. 53 21 and now 53 So he's pretty established in the top spot.

Now Trump's worried. No question he's worried about the Mar-a-Lago case. No question he's got to be concerned about the January sixth investigation. Where it is today, they think Mark Meadows might be a state's witness because no one's seen him. And they're wondering what happened.

And nobody knows more about what happened outside Donald Trump, what didn't happen. Besides Mark Meadows, And they don't know where he is right now because the former chief of staff was in the inner, inner, inner circle.

So that's what's happening in 2024. People are in tough spots, no doubt about it, because people. Like Lise Elden. Like Byron Donalds. They're friends and we're helping the Governor of Florida When re-election, And actually he helped them.

And now when it came to the general, it looks like they're going solid Trump. Hughes Byron Donalds, Cut Nine. We're going to do our work here on Capitol Hill. This process is going to continue. And when it is done, it is time for our party to unite and get behind our nominee and go win the White House.

For the people out there who are Republicans, who have had issues with Donald Trump in the past, I will give you two words, and that name is John Fetterman. You see, the Democrats do not care about whether you want to support the nominee or not. They are about victory, and we need to be about the very same thing. Right. That's it.

Will they consolidate? I think everybody consolidates. Tim Scott gets the nomination, they're all there. I don't think Donald Trump debates if the if the point spread se is this big in f in August. And I'm not sure that he consolidates he supports anybody who beats him.

Mike Huckabee says, don't worry about Donald Trump losing, cut 10. It's a long way before anybody even votes in a caucus or primary.

So there's a lot of time for things to happen. Ron DeSantis clearly steps into the race in the number two slot, but it's a distant number two. And what Ron DeSantis does not have at this point is a fanatically loyal base of people who are as fanatically loyal to him as they are to Donald Trump. Trump's base is unmovable. In fact, Trump's base is growing.

And in large part, the more the media and the government, but that's now become all one, the more they try to discredit And we find out about the lies and the criminal activity they've done to him and against him, I think the stronger it makes him.

So that he thinks he's picked up his base. That's his whole thing. If you want Trump to win and get the nomination, you have to ask yourself: what has he done to expand his voting base? Because right now, When we last left off, he lost Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Georgia. All say he's got to retain everything, and he's got at least three of those.

Can he do that? I'm sure. His team is the best team he's had. He's got to know this. This is his third campaign now.

He's no longer susceptible to rookie mistakes. He's got a pretty good strategist. We'll see where it goes. He's been pretty brutal to DeSantis. Let's see how he handles when people attack back because I think Chris Christie's going to get in there.

He'll attack. Mike Pence will get in there. He'll have mild attacks. But we'll see how Donald Trump does in the eye of the storm.

So, the other big story is the debt ceiling. Yeah, June 1st, if we don't find a way to lift the debt ceiling, we fail on all of our credit and we get downgraded from the Fitch people, which is not good. We lose our AAA rating. That's people investing, and people investing lose some money. But Kevin McCarthy got to give him credit.

He does every interview after these meetings, he lets everybody know his point of view. I think he's already got them to agree to repurposing the pandemic spending. They didn't want to do that. I think they are also trying to get workfare in for welfare for able-bodied people. People like the squad don't want any part of work, period.

But so far, I think that the left feels as though. Uh they are in charge. And Bernie Sanders is running this organization and running this negotiation. Here's what Kevin McCarthy said, how he'd characterize what's happening behind closed doors, COVID-19. We've offered a lot of concessions.

The cap on the spending is a Democrat idea. The work requirement was a Democrat idea. The time I can't help it if the Democrats have become so extreme and now is a party of Bernie Sanders than the party where Joe Biden was elected. Joe Biden is the President of the United States. He is the head Democrat.

But if AOC and Bernie Sanders is going to run their party, that's not my fault. I'm not even sure Bernie Sanders is a registered Democrat.

So They were calling press conferences yesterday, Hakeem Jeffries and the squad, and some people I didn't know there. I'm kind of watching it on C-SPAN. I'm saying, what's going on?

So they don't know what's going on. Hakeem Jeffries volunteered to leave with Mitch McConnell. And Schumer. He says, let's just let the President work this out with the House.

Okay.

So they're actually calling press conferences saying in general what I hear is going on.

So you talk about a fractured caucus. That was this reminds me of when Boehner was in charge and nobody was listening to him.

So McCarthy just says, listen, I'm going to kill you with availability.

So he'll just sit there and take question after question. And he's a likable guy. He doesn't lose his temper. That I could see. And he sees the big picture.

He's worried about the market, so he starts to talk more optimistic than maybe he feels. It only dropped 44 points yesterday. I'll talk about all that. Take your calls on how you think this is going to end up because I got my view and I'll give it to you next. I don't want to take too much time away from your calls.

1-866-408-7669 or write me BrianKillMe.com. Josh Cross Hour at the bottom of the hour. Don't move. Brian Killmee Chow. Politics, current events, and news that affects you.

Brian's got a lot more to say. Stay with Brian Kilmead. From the Fox News Podcasts Network. I'm Ben Dominich, Fox News contributor and editor of the Transom.com daily newsletter. And I'm inviting you to join a conversation every week.

It's the Ben Dominich Podcast. Subscribe and listen now by going to FoxnewsPodcasts.com. He's so busy, he'll make your head spin. It's Brian Kilmead. You can launch a presidential campaign poorly and still win your party's nomination.

It's happened. But this is a free shot at doing something really well. And if you do it really well, it can be something that people remember forever. And 2008, where Hillary Clinton announced from her sunroom, you had Barack Obama at the old statehouse in Springfield, Illinois on a cold day, giving an inspiring speech that produced not just a huge audience that watched it initially, but it was in thousands of Obama campaign ads. It was a moment that people looked back and set the tone and tenor for the campaign and gave them enormous amounts of coverage.

And people at Hillary Clinton's world thought that she gave a very nice speech in that sunroom, but it was not a thing anybody would ever remember again. It was a missed opportunity. I you know, Jonathan Heilman is not wrong. But what you do after is really key. I can remember that Beth, Kamala Harris, was awesome in her open remarks.

In fact, President Trump at the time said, Man, I watched it. That was great. The crowd was great. The speech was great. The content was strong.

But by the first interview, she blew herself up talking about the border wall, immigration, healthcare, mandatory health care. It was all over the map. That's the type of person she is. She's not buttoned up. She doesn't study.

She doesn't read the policy papers. Couldn't keep a staff. DeSantis got the money, he's got the foundation, he's got the staff, he's got the people, he's got a lot of Ted Cruz people, he's got a lot of Tallahassee people, and he's got a ton of money, he's got two super PACs. I think he's gonna be able to knock on every door. I don't know why he opened up the way he did.

But I think I'm open to saying there's no one way. And then Governor DeSantis is in an interesting spot. If you are Barack Obama, you say to yourself, I'm pretty sure I can get a pretty good crowd, and even because I'm a really good speaker. And I've found a best-selling book already. I'm pretty sure I can get a pretty good crowd in Illinois.

All right. He did it.

Now Trump can get a big crowd anywhere. You know who might not get the crowd? It will always be Compared? To Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis. President Trump will always have the biggest crowds, most enthusiastic crowds of any politician in all of our lifetime.

I can't see anybody matching it. Maybe if some celebrity decides to get in who's got an incredible popularity, Michael Jordan or something, it might be a different story, but you've got to have mixed out with personality and execution and accomplishment in the business world and the political world.

So maybe he's saying, let me just avoid this. Let me just get in this race. I've already had the big crowds in my book tour. I know what it's like to win the governorship. I don't need the crowd.

I don't know what went into it, but I will find out because I know a lot of the DeSantis people and I'll find out what went happened. Here's more from Heilman. Cut fifteen. Donald Trump, for all the criticism and all the terrible things that he said when he got down to the end of that escalator in 2016, people still talk about it today. Donald Trump, coming down the escalator in Trump Tower, he made an iconic moment for himself.

And part of the reason I was trying to remember, Bill Clinton announcing also announced the old state house in October of 1991 in Little Rock, a thing that, again, was in campaign ads for all of 1992. Can you win without a great slot? You can. But you have, you have a free throw here. And you have all the time in the world, as Ron DeSantis has, to set this up and get it right.

And they blew it in that sense. A missed opportunity. Yeah, I I'm I'm I appreciate that. I just saw a good solid analysis uh on MSNBC, which you almost never get. And we'll see where it goes.

I don't think people are gonna remember it. I think he's got two good ads out, I'll tell you that. Two really good ads. We'll see, the whole key is how he responds to the Trump criticism one by one on taxes, on Social Security, everything like that. Information you want, truth you demand.

This is the Brian Kill Me Show. And the pledge I'll make for people is simply this: we need to win again as Republicans. We got to dispense with this culture of losing. And if you nominate me, I pledge to you that on January 20th, 2025, at high noon, But I'll be the guy on the west side of the Capitol with the left hand on the Bible and the right hand in the air taking the oath of office as the 47th President of the United States. No more excuses.

We've got to get this one done. And that is Governor DeSantis last night, who wants to be President DeSantis. He was on with Trey after. The Twitter situation did not work out. Let's bring in Josh Kroshara, the senior political correspondent Axios.

You saw him on special report last night. Josh, how big a deal was the debacle with. Um Elon Musk. I think it's a pretty big deal. Look, I don't think everyone remembers every candidate's Announcement and even mistakes that are made along the way, but it's extending a pattern of mistakes that the DeSantis operation has engaged in.

Dating back to early in the year when they didn't engage Trump, they delayed their official presidential campaign announcement, they've leaned into some of these issues that, frankly, I don't think a whole lot of voters are quite as animated about as DeSantis himself, and especially with Disney, the fight with Disney right now. And look, I think this is sort of the capstone of it all, where it's a phenomenon where a lot of Politicians in both parties are on Twitter all the time. They're on social media. And they sometimes lose touch with. How ordinary people watch the news, watching it on Fox, watching it, reading the newspaper, kind of doing it the old-fashioned way.

And look, Twitter is still a space that not a lot of people are on, and certainly not a lot of like older voters that participate in Republican primary politics are involved in.

So it was embarrassing enough to have the glitch and to have it go. You know, problematically, but I just the decision to, this is your one chance. If you're a presidential candidate, to have everyone in the country, everyone in the world really, to pay attention to your announcement, your kickoff announcement. And the fact that you want to do it on Twitter, which is a much smaller audio only medium, instead of actually having a a big rally in Florida and where your thousands of your biggest fans are are cheering you on in front of an American flag, in front of your wife and kids. I don't understand the logic of doing that, and I think it it reflects some strategic missteps that this campaign has been making along the way.

Yeah, we'll see how it goes. But I as I brought up last block, Senator Harris had the best speech ever for a Democrat of everybody that rolled out last time. Big crowd, wonderful applause lines, well delivered, beautiful day. And even Donald Trump, who was president at the time, says, man, that was good. And we know what a disaster she was in her first sit-down.

I think DeSantis excels in sit-downs. And if I was him, I'd go on CNN. I would go into hostile territory after, and because he has, he does great when pressed. And if people have to say, don't say gay bill and book banning, mislabeling what he thinks he's done. That's a problem.

When asked, he does a great job defining himself. Yeah, that's exactly right, Brian. I think he has a great record, too, in Florida. I mean, sometimes you get lost in kind of the nitty-gritty. The big picture record for the governor is really, really good.

He basically has been a successful executive of the third biggest state in the country. He was one of the most successful governors in not freaking out over the COVID crisis and actually keeping the economy strong. and not shutting down, which is something he did talk about in the in the in the Twitter conversation. But I think the big picture is the economy and making sure the state didn't flounder during during that COVID period. You know, he is I I think a lot of the the woke issues in the big the big picture sense, I think are smart, but when you get involved in sort of all the acronyms and abbreviations and and the kind of the decal, it can lose a lot of people because I don't know if everyone's following it to the same degree that the the governor and some of his big supporters are.

But look, he has an economic record to cheer about. He has a record of keeping the state open during COVID that I think a lot of people paid attention to and put him on the political map. He needs to focus on the big picture issues that voters care about, Republican voters care about. I think the risk he faces is kind of narrow casting to Twitter spaces and going on podcasts that certainly have a fan base, but he needs to get attention from the larger electorate, the average Iowa voter, the average New Hampshire voter. And I don't know if last night accomplished that goal.

Uh I want you to hear what Newt Gingrich said, cut twelve. I think he has to find a big positive message And I think you're right, it mostly is about the economy. And he has to communicate somehow that he's uniquely different from Trump. that he's the guy who can get it done. Possible?

Yeah, I mean, look, he has the record. The line that he sort of. mentioned at times is that he's actually done the work. He's actually effectively governed where Trump has picked the fights, but hasn't he's pointed to the limitations he had as president in getting his agenda passed. That's what we should be hearing from the governor.

We should be seeing more of a contrast against Donald Trump, who, by the way, like he's up by 30, 40 points in all the latest polls, the Fox poll that came out yesterday. Trump has a 30, I believe, a 33-point lead. I mean, eventually, DeSantis is going to have to make the case why he, not Trump, should be the Republican nominee. And that's got to come sooner than later. That's going to be the prerequisite in people considering an alternative to the former president.

So the one thing he says words like Winning Trust Insanity. There was a subtle hit to Trump because he's got to do what I don't know is possible: win, beat Trump, and bring his voters with him.

So if you win a if you win a brawl But you walk out with no supporters, there's no sense having to fight. That's right. And look, I think that Trump isn't subtle when he makes his case, when he's on the attack. There's no subtlety there. It is in your faith.

And it is it it is literally motto a motto. And DeSantis, you know, he's talking about the culture of losing where he doesn't mention Trump's name, but everyone knows what he's Talking about, but he's not very explicit about making the contrasts clear. And eventually, he's going to have to do that. He's going to have to. Go on the debate stage if Trump shows up at the Fox debate in August and make the case against Trump to his face.

And he seems a little re a little bit reticent to do that, but ultimately if you want to be the guy, you've got to beat the guy in front of you. And I haven't seen that kind of fire in the belly from DeSantis. He he certainly knows how to pick fights, Brian. He he's been doing it his whole career in Florida, but he seems to be a little reticent about picking a fight against Trump, who ultimately is is is the frontrunner and is ahead of him in the polls.

So, Truth Social, Donald Trump's site, he posted this. I'd like to personally congratulate Rob. Yeah. The sanctimonious. On finally announcing that he'll be entering the race for president of the United States.

Hopefully, he'll get the full experience of being attacked by the Marxists, communists, and radical left lunatics in our country. Without that, we'll never know the kind of job he is doing. These lowlives and misfits are far worse than the leaders of hostile foreign relations. They must be soundly defeated in order to make America great.

So calling him Rob is new. Then he said, Rob, my red button is bigger, better, stronger, and is working. Truth, yours does too. Per my conversation with Kim Jong-un of North Korea, soon to become my friend.

So no one knows what to make of that. Do you? Is that one of the I know he doesn't drink, but it's one of those drunk attacks where you go, what was I thinking? Yeah, we we need to have like a Trump truth social interpreter because some of these I yeah, I don't know, the Rob reference, like, uh confusing. I don't I d I honestly have I don't haven't heard a good answer on w where that came from.

And the I mean, I I don't know what he's talking about with the with the red button. Maybe it's an allusion to like his National security credentials. I really don't know. And that, look, I think that is the worry. If you're in the Trump campaign, The one thing that surprised a whole lot of observers and analysts is how professional Trump's operation has been this year.

And they really are going after DeSantis. They're laying out the message pretty clearly on a day-to-day basis. But Trump himself has not really changed. And we're seeing from these tweets on Truth Social, it's a little bit confusing, and he's not really disciplined on message.

So, I mean, that is, look, I think there are a lot of the reason. No one's going after Trump yet, but I think one of the reasons You're seeing that reticence from DeSantis and others, is they think that maybe Trump is going to kind of. You know, whether it's through some of these indictments, perhaps coming down the pike, or to some of his own tweets or comments. You know, lose some steam on his own. I'm not convinced of that.

I don't think that's necessarily going to happen. But um this is an example Trump that is not. um built the last in the in the presidential election.

So let's talk about the debt ceiling. I I just find it unbelievable in the big picture that the President of the United States would cut off the trip to Australia and the one to Papua New Guinea, which is in p it sounds funny, but it's actually really important. They took a day off from school and work and they painted the whole place for the first president ever to visit. And he blows it off, comes back. Nothing gets done, and now he's going to Camp David and then he's going to his summer home during Memorial Day.

Well, yeah, I mean, look, the the ultimate question is whether we can avert a disaster with the debt ceiling. Brian, one thing that I think gets underplayed in Washington is that Kevin McCarthy has so far really won. Everything. President Biden. Remember, it wasn't that long ago that the president was saying, I'm not going to negotiate with anyone in the Republican caucus.

They're way too extreme. And now he's actually playing ball and accepting, it sounds like, some of the provisions, not everything, but some of the spending cuts or at least restraint on spending that Republicans passed in the House.

So, look, Kevin McCarthy has already won on the politics. The fact that Biden has moved closer to where Republicans were when he said he was never going to do that is a really important sign. And look, I think McCarthy, I remember when George W. Bush was president, he talked about the bigotry of low expectations.

Well, I think you could say the same for Kevin McCarthy because not a lot of people gave him, thought he was going to do much with a narrow majority in the House. And he's. Essentially, he beat the Democrats on crime, on immigration. And it seems like he may get some major compromises when it comes to this speech. Spending cuts and the debt ceiling.

And Josh, I know you have been all over the president thing, so at Axios, you got a wide beat there. But what I understand they've basically agreed on is repurposing the pandemic funds. But I also think that they've got some semblance of a workfare agreement when it comes to welfare for those eligible for it. And everyone should agree in certain situations it's not possible. And those two things, now they're trying to cut down the 87,000 IRS agents and go back to 2022 spending.

Anything else, areas of agreement or real contention our audience should know about?

Well, I've heard that the IRS, some of the IRS tax provisions actually may be going the Republicans' way. I have heard the Democrats are holding the line. a lot more when it comes to making work requirements as a demand of getting welfare benefits.

So we'll those the the nitty-gritty is going to be hashed out. We'll find out pretty soon where the compromise, if there is one, is reached. There's also a question of like how much Will there be defense spending cuts or restraint? Republicans are actually for raising some spending levels for national security. And I think the president would be satisfied just holding the line.

So I think, you know, where they get the spending cuts from and how they end up kind of reaching certain levels of spending, it's going to be interesting to watch. I do think there are going to be spending cuts or at least movement in that direction. And that's a big victory for Republican.

So, but the thing is, I'm amazed at is. Ken McCarthy is making himself available, and some other lawmakers in there are making themselves available non-stop. How many questions?

Okay, I'll sit here. I'm optimistic. We're going to get something done. The president, whatever you want. But they're available and they're talking in an upbeat way and not yelling at people.

President's been invisible. KJP has been uninformed to say, Yeah, I really know that. Doesn't really approach me. I don't know if they're doing in clear faith.

So they've lost the communications battle.

So, therefore, you see Hakeem Jeffries calling his own press conference, the squad calling their own press conference. Jerry Nadler was caught up too. Listen to him, cut 18.

Well, number one, I don't think it it appears that both sides want to make concessions. The Republicans have made very clear that they're making that they want to make no concessions at all. That quote that we heard from Matt Gates, that we're holding that we're not going to negotiate with our host we're not going to negotiate with our hostage. You didn't hear the speaker contradict that. And we haven't seen the speaker being willing to make any concessions whatsoever.

Appear to be no concessions. Appear to be apparently. They're not in. They don't know. Yeah.

Brian, one rule of politics that I always subscribe to is that the party that's united is the one that's winning, the one that's divided is the one that's losing. Look, Republicans are united so far. They even the Freedom Caucus folks, they have not Criticized Kevin McCarthy. They may be some internal disagreements, but Kevin McCarthy has kept everything inside the family. And this past week, you've seen.

AOC, Pramila Jayapal, Nadler. You have a bunch of progressives saying different things in the leadership. They're all over the map. And that shows you how their negotiating strategy has fallen apart and why I think you're going to end up seeing some notable concessions when assuming that a compromise is indeed reached. I would think it's going to be reached.

Do you? Do you see them just paying certain bills that's been done before in the past? And it goes past June first? It's like studying for like a final. You you do it, and you end up doing it, and you get it done, but you wait till the last minute, you procrastinate.

This is how these negotiations always seem to end up working. I think the big question is: is it a short term there a short-term sort of fix, and then there's a longer deal that comes across after that, or does it all Hashed out before June 1st. I think we'll probably see the deadline move back a little bit, but ultimately they will be, in my guess, a compromise reach. Yeah, it would make you looking at the barbecue with one eye and the other eye watch listening to the television, wondering if you had to go to work and write about a debt deal this Memorial Day weekend. Josh, thanks so much.

Thanks, Brian. Have a good holiday weekend. You too. Always appreciate the insight.

Meanwhile, when we come back, we'll take your calls: 1-866-408-7669. You listen to the Brian Kilmeat Show. Expanding your knowledge base. It's the Brian Kill Meet Show. From his mouth to your ears, it's Brian Killmead.

In January 2020, he was assigned to what he calls a high-profile investigation. Who's the subject of the investigation? I can't confirm or deny the subject of this investigation. Why not? Because, you know, part of the tax secrecy laws don't allow it.

Shapley can't say it, but CBS News has learned the investigation was the probe of Hunter Biden by the Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney in Delaware. Senior Biden administration officials have vowed to let it run its course without interference. But CBS News has obtained this letter Shapley's lawyers sent to Congress Monday, alleging irregularities in DOJ's handling of the investigation. Shapley is seeking legal protections from Congress so he can share specifics of his allegations.

That is CBS, and that is a whistleblower, the second one. On a guy unnamed, but we all know, as he concluded, Hunter Biden, whistleblowers need protections. We always thought they got protections. Vinman got protections, didn't he? He was held up as a hero.

How dare you even say anything about him? But we watched four FBI agents testify last week on how they were really destroyed. They were fired. They can't even get their records to get another job, get a firearms license. It's all kept under lock and key.

That's called retribution. And we thought we would not allow that in this country. It's nuts. Absolutely insane what's happening. And for CBS to report it, by the way, I watched Anderson Cooper a little bit last night just to see if they were.

They did a segment on it. And you know Right now, James Comer is trying to kind of sit down with Christopher Ray. In an attempt to get the paperwork necessary for a whistleblower to come forward that shows that Joe Biden was doing deals and getting paid off when he was vice president. Cynthia, listen on WTKF over in North Carolina. Hey, Cynthia.

Hey, Brian, good to hear from you. Love your show. Love Fox News. I'm going to use the debate. Uh, for all this with the Republican primary uh candidates, I'm gonna do a sports analogy here.

Okay, we got all these. candidacy and great team, great, great for the Republican Party.

So you know what? Donald Trump, as you've always said, has the best team head coaches he's ever had in an election.

So why not sit back, let these guys that and Mickey Haley and anybody else debate it out And then what? President former president, have a semifinal. That's good. That's interesting. Have a you guys ballot out for number two.

I'll take your number two, but I'm not going to take all eight. I think all eight actually helps Trump. From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest-growing radio talk show. Brian Kilmead. Hi, everyone.

Welcome to the latest moment to the Brian Killmead Show.

So glad you're here this hour. I hope we can get it all in. Jeff Benedict, who wrote the best-selling book on LeBron James, who brought his team to the semifinals, swept out, talking about retirement. Jeff Benedict, one of the prolific author, great biographer, will be with us. And by the way, if you want to talk about a sport, That has young people watching.

The youngest, I believe, is the NBA. Varney and company will do go inside the economy and other things. Whatever Stewart has on his mind, I will try to handle, and he will disagree about something. And Mark Thiessen standing by, Washington Post columnist, Fox News contributor, and really smart guy, and he's tall. Mark, welcome.

Good to be with you. Hey, first off, let's get it out of the way. Uh the Twitter Debacle. Big deal not. Not a debacle.

Not a debacle at all. That's a left-wing spin on this. 6.5 million people. Tuned in to that Twitter story. Who did that number?

I did not hear that number. That's from that's from Twitter. That's from who's the guy who interviewed him? Sachs.

Okay, because I heard a million.

So you heard six. That's interesting. Well, there was a million at the start, but over the course of the whole event, six point five million. That's the biggest live event ever on social media. And so it crashed the system.

You know what? If six point five million, that's double the viewers that tuned into Trump's Town Hall.

So I don't know how that how having millions of people tune in, so many people tune in that you crash the system is a debacle. It's it's qui it's the opposite of a debacle.

So, you know, I mean, c you know, th the the you know, maybe maybe uh you know, the CNN and other people don't like it because they got they got more viewers on Twitter spaces than uh than they got for their Trump uh Trump event.

So I just don't see I think it I think that's a triumph. I think that's a you know, he's the Kim Kardashian of Republican politics. He crashed the Internet.

So he said, by the way, I just don't understand the audio, the choice to not have video was bizarre. Yeah, I assume you could have video on Twitter, so I don't know. But again, that's all on Musk. That's not on DeSantis. You know, they should have had enough server.

They should have anticipated how many people were going to be there and have the server capacity ready, and they probably should have done video. But you know what? He did that at six. He was with Trey Gowdy on Fox in his first live interview on television as a candidate. I was on a conference call with him with conservative writers.

He had multiple rollouts in one night. They raised a million dollars in the first hour. It's six and a half million people tuning in to your event, trying to listen. I'd say it's a pretty good rollout.

So a couple of things. Um With Ron DeSanders. Number one, he's about 20 points down, but head to head he beats Joe Biden. even though it's within the margin of error, I get it. I know it's a national poll, I understand it.

I know it's a sample of one thousand, and those experts say it's still reflective. But I don't think the game has started yet. And for the record, this morning, I did mention on the air that it is if I was interviewing Ron DeSantis on Fox and if the shot went down and we law Fox went down, it wouldn't be Ron DeSantis' fault. Exactly.

So but the decision this is an interesting decision. Uh and that is not to have a rally. And not to sit there and try to pack the place and have the great optics and be able to use that as a possible spot down the line where you might be able to well, here's what John Heilman said. He had an interesting take, cut fourteen. You can launch a presidential campaign poorly and still win your party's nomination.

It's happened. But this is a free shot at doing something really well. And if you do it really well, it can be something that people remember forever. And 2008, where Hillary Clinton announced from her sunroom, you had Barack Obama at the old State House in Springfield, Illinois on a cold day giving an inspiring speech that produced not just a huge audience that watched it initially, but it was in thousands of Obama campaign ads. It was a moment that people look back and set the tone and tenor for the campaign and gave them enormous amounts of coverage.

And people in Hillary Clinton's world thought that she gave a very nice speech in that sunroom, but it was not a thing anybody would ever remember again. It was a missed opportunity. So your thought about that, that's a point, correct?

So I guess he's never going to have a rally that he can use for a campaign ad? Ah! I mean, I don't get the point. He crashed Twitter. He got his message out.

He's going to have campaign rallies. I mean, I just don't understand the whole, you know, cool. That's why you're a great guest. That's why you're a great perspective. Thank you.

Thank you. I love the fact that you're so rude enough to disagree with the host. How dare you? And who keeps booking you every week? I've got to educate you, man.

No, believe me, I find myself the only one defending DeSantis these days. It's almost as if he's the worst guy on the planet.

Now, first, give me your perspective. Do you ever remember a number two? Clearly number two in all the polls, be so widely attacked by whether it's Nikki Haley trailing him, whether it's Donald Trump leading him, or every Democrat with a microphone, or the President of the United States, the DNC. I've never seen anything like it. They all see him as a threat.

He's being attacked by Trump, being insufficiently MAGA. He's being attacked by Nikki Haley as too MAGA. A choice, not an echo. I mean, which by the way, the majority of, if you look at the polls, so the majority of Republicans are considering Trump up considering other people. But 49% of Republicans are not locked into Trump.

They're open to other candidates, right? Wall Street Journal poll.

So, but they all like Trump. They just aren't sure they want to vote for him another time.

So to attack him as too Trump, as too close to Trump, as an echo of Trump, most Republicans would like a echo of the things they like in Trump, but not the things they don't like about Trump.

So I don't see how that seems like more of an endorsement than an attack. Um so I just don't get the I don't get Nikki Haley's approach. Doesn't make sense to me. It's interesting, you know, he does want to alienate Trump. It's because you're never going to win the nomination and alienate his people, but somehow you've got to show he's different while still being friends.

It's a fascinating take. We'll never have this again, by the way. Barack Obama couldn't care less if he was friends with Hillary Clinton, and vice versa, obviously. They just wanted to get the nomination. And nobody was afraid of getting the wrong side of Joe Biden.

They just decided to consolidate, like Pete Buttigiege and Elizabeth Warren, decide, all right, I'll step aside for the good of the party. Say that again? We're going to need to do that too at some point. There's going to have to be a consolidation at some point. But this is the start of the campaign.

That comes later.

So here's last night he talked about How he is going to take on Trump, but not directly. He wasn't asked directly. What I'm going to do with him next time I talk to him, and I know I'll have the opportunity. Because he does give opportunities and does give interviews. And I think he does better in contentious situations because people challenge him on book bands.

That's not what it is.

Well, don't say gay build. That's not what it is.

When he talks about anything that they want to go after him on pro-life, that's not what he's talking about. He needs to be pressed to fully define and flesh out how people are choosing to label him. And he actually does better. And so if I was him, I would sit down with. With somebody that's somewhat fair on CNN and MSNBC and Washington Post and New York Times, someone that is just not going to.

The altitude.

Someone like me. Yeah. Well, you're watching. Yeah, that's true. You wouldn't have a problem with that.

Here's what he said about fighting Disney. Cut for it. What ended up happening, though, is that they had this cushy arrangement that they got decades ago where they had their own government in Central Florida. They were exempt from laws that everyone else had to follow, and they got massive tax breaks and even racked up municipal debts.

So, what we said was: look, we're not comfortable having this company on a pedestal joined at the hip with the state of Florida. Our values have just gone in different directions, and so we ended their self-governing status. They now have to live under the same laws as everybody else, and they have to pay their fair share of taxes.

So they're in now, he's in a blood feud with people with extremely deep pockets and experienced lawyers. Where would you go with this if you're a DeSantis? Good for him. Our people love this, and it's right. They're not entitled to corporate welfare.

I mean, you know, it's not an anti-free market, as some conservatives have attacked them to take on corporate welfare for a company that's trying to undermine the education of children in your state. Look, here's the great thing about DeSantis and why he has a certain appeal.

So, if you look at the 2022 midterms, right, the disastrous results for Republicans, broadly speaking, we were basically told we had to choose between two different kinds of candidates, and you can't have both. Forward-looking, reform-minded governors like DeSantis, like Kemp, like DeWine, who were able to appeal to swing voters, and populist rabble-rousers who got the GOP faithful really pumped up, but couldn't win over independence. And the thing about DeSantis is, you don't have to choose 'cause he's both. He is a populist. He's taking on Disney.

He's sending illegal migrants to Martha's Vineyard. He's taking on the woke agenda. But look at what he did in the state legislature. in the last few months, school choice, banning ESG investment, the the constitutional carry legislation, making protecting people by making child rapists eligible for the death penalty, taking on bail reform, the Luckwing bail reform. He's Produced a wrath of forward-looking conservative reforms that are making people's lives better, and so.

We really don't have to choose between those two things. And he offers them both. And that's a unique position he has in the Republican field. And so, you know, I we'll see if that if that sells. Uh it certainly seemed to sell to the 6.5 million people who tuned in for for the for the Twitter Spaces thing last night.

It certainly sold in Florida. He won by twenty points and he won independence. He won Hispanics. He won women. If he can replicate that on the national stage while not conceding anything in terms of fighting wokeness and fighting taking on the left culture war against the against the American values.

I d I I see that as a as a win-win.

So you write speeches and you write columns.

So right now, the way he takes on Trump is sanity and truth. Those are the words he used. Saturday in Truth. How much more do you need to do? Do you need to say?

I watched President Trump's speech last night. He was all over the place. And he's still re-litigating 2020. What the hell? Or do you say.

You need when you speak, you speak forward. Talk about going forward. We need a rational leader that's going to bring the or do you just directly say exactly what bothers you about the guy who's leading you? I think you focus forward. You focus elections are about the future.

I think you focus about what you want to do. I think you focus he should do what Trump should be doing and isn't doing, which is talk about how disastrous the Biden administration is and how much better it could be with conservative leadership. And to the extent that Trump promised to relitigate twenty twenty, you just let him. Let him spend his time doing that. And all you do is you say, Look, I'm not here to fight about the 2020 election, I'm here to fight the 2024 election.

And you d uh he's probably going to take on Trump on substance. I don't think you attack him personally. I don't think you take it. Even though he's attacking you personally. Even though they're saying you're boring, you need a personality transplant.

You know what you say? I didn't put Fauci in charge of the economy. Yeah. I I stopped him from being in charge of the economy in Florida. You know, I I th there are areas, you know, I you know, where you where you can draw distinctions with him.

But, you know, but but you don't you don't go after him because look, you have to realize the the people what you're trying to accomplish as DeSantis or any of these Republican candidates is to separate the the the half of the Republican electorate. There's only twenty four percent of Republicans who say they will vote only for their they're only interested in Trump in the primary. 76% either don't want Trump or are open to somebody else. And so you gotta separate those people from Trump who like Trump. And so the way you do it is not by getting in the mud with him and attacking him and echoing the left and their attacks on him.

The way you do it is by saying, look, I I I the difference between me and Trump is, one, I can serve for two terms, to I can win. We lost the 2020 election. You keep saying winning. I won, you know, so I'm a winner. I can give you everything that you like about this guy.

You don't say it quite in these words. I give you everything you like about this guy without the baggage, and I'm going to win. I'm going to serve for eight years. All right, we got that. I should have left you more time for Ukraine, but I just want you to hear the leader of the Wagner group through translation say something.

I've been hearing analysts say, but never somebody in the fight. He just won Bakhmut, and he says this, cut 27.

Now, with regard to demilitarization, if they had 500 tanks at the beginning of special military operation, now they have 5,000. If they had 20,000 able to fight, now they have 400,000 able to fight.

So, how did we demilitarize? It turns out that, on the contrary, we have militarized Ukraine. And he talks about this being a mistake, that the elites are not letting the children of elites are not going into this war, avoiding the draft, and how this could be 1917 in Russia again. I've read this thing twice.

Now, I'm open to the fact that he might not be as candid, but what does that tell you about the reality of what's about to happen knowing the offensive is going to be happening shortly, if not happening already, for Ukrainians? Yeah. I mean, I think it's remarkable that the head of the Wagner Group is speaking out against Putin this this openly and this brazenly. You know, the the the it seems like the fear of Putin is now who who knows, he could end up falling out of a window somewhere.

So he's got a lot of security. And he's got a lot of people under arms.

So he's probably harder to kill than some oligarch who's in a hotel and suddenly trips down a staircase or falls out of a window like a lot of these guys who dare to criticize. But I think that's quite remarkable. I think this, look, this war has clearly backfired on Putin. And it it's quite frankly, it's putting his rule at risk. Fascinating.

I just think the people that were standing by Ukraine hoping they got it together, knowing they've already sacrificed 42,000 civilians, I think the best is yet to come. I hope for their side. I got a big piece in the Washington Post next Tuesday. four thousand word piece laying out the America first case for you for helping Ukraine. I want to talk to you about it next week when it comes out.

You know, I'll be the first to call. Thanks so much, Mark. Have a great weekend. Take care. You got it.

1-866-408-7669. Bottom of the hour, Jeff Benedict. We take a break from politics, talk a little basketball. This is the Brian Kilmey Show. Coming to you on a need-to-know basis because Mandy, you need to know.

It's Brian Kilmead. A talk show that's real. This is the Brian Kill Meat Show. Hey, let's go to Alex, listen on WABC in Brooklyn. Hey, Alex.

Uh oh, thank you for taking my call. Yeah, I just wanted to say Uh Uh to the voters. If you want to make an educated, informed vote about which is the best candidate in the upcoming Republican primaries, Make sure that you'd go beyond just sound bites of radio and television.

So go read the Wall Street Journal, read the New York Times, Read things that are in depth and pick one area that is of interest to you, for example, healthcare, and read about it. And take that knowledge and make an informed vote. Too often, people just use sound bites and they end up with a distorted view of the world and they make the disastrous choice. And the thing is, too, in the case of DeSantis or a congressman, find out where they voted. Find out what they stand for and find out how they voted and find out what they've done.

With Trump, we all know what he's done and didn't do, and you kind of made your decision. Alex, are you a teacher? Um Yes, I I do teach part-time. Uh sounds it.

So yes, it would be great. I would love for people to take you don't have to live it like we do, but I'd just love for people to take their time and understand that a thirty second ad should get you interested enough to look into something. And when someone does an attack ad, Opposition research. Find out what's true or not. And that's why if I am DeSantis, I can't wait for someone to tell me I am banning books.

I look forward to someone saying I'm raising the retirement age to seventy. I look forward to him saying I'm looking to give everybody a twenty five percent tax. Because if you remove the rest of the taxes, From a fare tax, you're actually paying, for the most part, less. You get less write-offs. That used to be a conservative position.

And then you start getting into the situation.

So you'd want that. And I just found the best candidates want the difficult interviews because they have the answers. If you have the answers, you want the hard questions. The problem is when your answers aren't good, then you try to avoid it until the controversy calms down. Believe me, they're all going to make mistakes and they're going to want to avoid some.

DeSantis does better at that than most. Quinton here runs a sustainable clothing brand. Hi there! He's excited that his shipping company, FedEx, has set a goal of having carbon-neutral operations by 2040. Impressive.

When an influencer tweeted about his recycled bamboo t-shirts, Quinton unexpectedly became quite popular. I'll take He uses FedEx to reach new customers around the globe. While making Earth a priority. FedEx, where now meets next. A radio show like no other.

It's Brian Killmade. But we'll see, we'll see what happens going forward. I don't know. I don't know. I got a lot to think about, to be honest.

I had a lot to think about, to be honest, and uh Just for me personally, going forward with the game of basketball. Not a lot to think about. And that is LeBron James after getting swept by the Denver Nuggets. Having a remarkable run of the playoffs from a guy who's on a team that started off horrendously. Everybody was injured.

They came back. They won the play-in game and advanced to the semifinals. He's wondering, at his age, does he want to keep playing, knowing his son is entering USC? Joining us now is Jeff Benedict, a multi-New York Times best-selling author. And his latest book is a bestseller called LeBron.

I was just in the airport. It is everywhere. Jeff, welcome back. Hey, Brian, it's good to be back with you again. Of course, you did the definitive biography, my view on Tiger Woods, too.

So we'll talk about that. But first, is LeBron serious or just exhausted? Uh both. Uh I think he's both serious and exhausted. At his age, you know, he's 38.

He's been doing this for 20 years. The NBA has an incredibly long season. And the playoffs are like a second season, and he took his team all the way to the Western Conference Finals. He's tired, not just physically, but emotionally and mentally. And so I think he's both serious and tired.

He does have a lot to think about, Brian. He doesn't have anything left to prove to anybody. And I think when players like him and Tom Brady get to the end of a season, They do have a lot to think about. They're older than all the other guys. They they're fathers and husbands with families and grown kids, and they have a lot of things going on besides the sport.

And so I think you you were seeing and hearing all of that in his voice the other night. How well did he play, in your view? I thought he played off the charts. I mean Thirty Points in the first half, finished with forty one. you know, rebound shy of a triple-double.

He played every minute of the game other than the four se last four seconds of the first half. By the way, None of the younger players on either team did that.

So I thought he he plays remarkably well, especially given the fact that he's older than everyone else on the floor. Yeah, and they did surprise and they did seem to make the right coaching change in the beginning of the year. And they did start off with maybe I think they were five and fifteen or something horrendous like that to start the year. Two and ten. Two and ten.

Uh and they end up coming all the way back. It's kind of an interesting playoff on the side note too. But what Miami's done been absolutely unbelievable. What Butler has pulled off, uh was I've never seen anything like it from a player that was never supposed to be that good, was supposed to be good, but not one of the top five players in the league. And he did this during the pandemic year when they lost to the Lakers, Miami.

And now they they're another eighth seed with who won the play-in game and is now one win away from getting to the finals. You know, the thing, you're right. I mean, Jimmy Butler's like a junkyard dog. I mean, you don't want to get in a fight with him. And the Celtics have been in a fight with him, and they've been losing the entire way.

One of the things, if you want to take the Miami situation back and put it in the context of LeBron. I think it says more about the Celtics than it does about the heat. That team is loaded. They've got two superstars. They've got.

Arguably the most talent on one team in the Eastern Conference, and they have yet to win a championship, and they're not going to win one this year. And what that tells you is, it tells you how hard it is. To do what LeBron has done, what Steph Curry has done. These guys who have won multiple championships. it's a really, really hard thing to do at that level.

And the Heat are demonstrating that by what they've been doing to the Celtics in these playoffs. Um Absolutely.

So let let's talk about LeBron. The the conventional wisdom was he wants to play against or with his son. Why so close would he stop now? Knowing that he accepted a scholarship, I'm sure he's already a multi-millionaire with this whole NIL stuff.

So Uh with Bronny in at USC, why wouldn't he keep playing? I don't think it's a matter of LeBron changing his mind. I think it's look. One of the things I like about LeBron is he's unafraid and unabashed about expressing Is His love and his passion for his kids, you know, more so than any other athlete we watch. LeBron does it.

And he was very vocal about wanting to play with his son. But here's the thing: I mean, His son is going to be a freshman in college. Who knows what he wants to do? Does he want to play for three or four years? Does he want to be a college student?

Does he want to enjoy the experience of being at USC? I think what you're hearing in LeBron is an acknowledgment that what he wants it may not be exactly the same thing that his son wants. Not to say that his son wouldn't want the honor of playing with his dad, but it's also like his son has his own life. And I think, you know, LeBron probably recognizes that as much as he'd like to play with his son. Whether that can actually happen in a practical way is different.

Understood. And you know what? He might not be that good. He may be obviously Division I scholarship to be widely recruited, got to be. four or five star, got it.

But how many of them don't pan out? I mean, 1% make it to the NBA, correct? Yeah, it's a tremendous amount of pressure. You know, even to put on the sun. And I think, you know, being the son of someone like Tom Brady or LeBron James or these guys, it's just that alone.

Even if you're not an athlete, it's a massive amount of pressure to be the son of somebody that famous. We see the same thing in other forms of entertainment, the music industry, Hollywood. It's a lot of pressure on a kid. And Bronnie, for all that we can see, has shouldered it pretty well. LeBron was built to deal with this kind of scrutiny because he was compared to Michael Jordan as a teenager.

It may very well be that, you know, Bronny would like maybe not to have that much visibility and pressure on him. And for the league. Do you think LeBron has done as much for the league as Jordan has done? I mean, I don't get the sense that he's viewed the same way outside his circles. As much money as he made, the championships he's won, as well he's playing at 40 years old, got it.

But I just don't get the same feeling, having lived through Jordan, that I'm getting about him. I hear what you're saying, Brian, and I lived through Jordan too and saw him play live many times. I think what Jordan did for the league was transformative in terms of saving the game. Um he he Change the NBA at a time when the NBA was in a rough place. Magic and Larry had it on life support.

kept it going and then Jordan came and did two things. He elevated the NBA to the point where it was like America's game while he was in the league, but he also changed the sneaker industry. In a way that affected America's culture. Those were huge paradigm shifts that Jordan did. What LeBron has done, I think, is equally powerful but different.

In other words, He didn't change the game of basketball the way that Michael did. But what he did change is the business of basketball. And I think every player that's in the NBA today realizes that. They understand it. Regardless of how they feel about LeBron personally, they respect the fact that he has changed the business of basketball and improved it immensely for players.

He's e equaled the scales between owners and players. he's responsible for elevating salaries and bargaining power. He's changed a lot of things for players that I think will be appreciated even more historically as we get further away from his career. I want to talk about Tiger Woods. He's pulled out of another major.

It looks like he has Planta. uh something or other He's got other issues. I guess it could be stemming all from the accident. Do you think he's basically done? It's an interesting question because we've been talking about LeBron and we've talked about Tom Brady.

And I think the hardest moment for any athlete, not just the superstars, but any athlete, is when they're standing at the precipice looking over it and realizing that the end might be here. And that's an even harder moment when you've reached the status of LeBron or Tom Brady or Tiger. It's hard to accept the end. I think Tiger's been he's been at that precipice actually for a long time. Brady got off the stage and he's walked away.

LeBron is probably close to that. Tiger's been limping along. I mean, quite literally limping along. And I think at some point, you know, he's probably going to have to just exit because. He's the kind of guy who isn't playing just to play.

He plays to win, and he can't win. You can't win when you can't make it through four rounds because of physical limitations. And that's really what it is for him. It's not a mental thing with him, it's a physical thing. I mean, it's not like, well, he's getting older, the swing's gotten less, he's not driving as far.

Those would be the good problems to have. You change your game, you figure out a way, and he's great at that. But we don't know what that leg looks like. No, he you're right. He is great at that.

He's he mentally a genius at that. But there's only so much you can do with body parts that have screws in them and plates in them and things like that. He's been operated on so many times. He's broken bones. He's had vertebrae problems.

Now he's got leg and ankle problems. It's like At some point, he is going to have to hang it up because he just simply can't compete physically. I know. You would think he's a middle linebacker, the type of injuries he had. Tell you, congratulations, Jeff.

The book is already a bestseller, has been from the day it launched. It's called LeBron. Guys, pick it up, get a perspective, a real fair look and deep look into the greatest player of his generation.

Some say ever. Jeff, congratulations. Thank you, Brian. All right. Varney and Company next: Simulcast.

Now, the Brian Kilmead Show joins Fox Business's Varney and Company with Stuart Varney, live on your radio and on Fox Business. Here's Brian Kilmead. Hey, welcome back. We're gonna do a simulcast. This is the guy with the deep voice said.

Now, listen, on the back end. I'll be able to take some calls right before. Stuart usually gives me about two minutes, two and a half at the end of this to close out the hour on the Thursday edition and what we've been talking about. And as you know, we're talking about the Santos Big appearance. We're talking about Donald Trump's retort on Truth Social.

One, in the beginning, I understand it. Why he's calling him Rob and not Ron is weird. Um I don't get it to be clear. And the other thing was happening in Ukraine. Let's listen in and hear Stuart.

Here is Brian Kilmead. Brian, welcome back to the show. I want you to listen to what he had to say on day one. This is DeSantis. What he had to say on day one about the border crisis.

Watch this. Roll it, please. Day one, it's a national emergency. We'll mobilize all resources to construct the border wall, shut the border down. We'll finally get that done and take care of it because Republicans have been asking about this for years and years and years.

I follow through. I'll use all the levers at my disposal to be able to get it done, and we will finally put this issue to bed once and for all. Hey, Brian, do you think that was a dig at Donald Trump? Yes. Absolutely.

But he didn't say he didn't do it. Like Governor Sununu is coming out and say he didn't do it. Governor Christie says he didn't do it. I wouldn't approach it that way. The way he said it is the right way to do it, because you know what President Trump tried to do.

He did everything possible. He got $1.8 billion for the wall for Paul Ryan twice. You need $10 billion. He got 450 miles done. They said, well, a lot of it was redone.

Well, some of it was split rail fence.

So I don't consider that replacement. You know, those other, the crazy other or the razor wire.

So this stuff was put in there.

Now, you know what drives me crazy, Stuart? We have an affiliate in McCallum, Texas. And there is fence laying in between blocks that we paid for, wall that we paid for. And just on spite, even though we watch it working on a daily basis when everyone's watching Tidal 42 go away, every network was down there. And we're seeing how good the wall was as opposed to the big gaps, the 12 gaps in Arizona.

And out of spite, we paid for it, taxpayers, and it's laying in the desert, laying between blocks. And there's a contractor already paid to put it up, and he's being paid not to work. Is pathetic and ridiculous, frankly, when you've got to border crisis like this.

Next one. Do you think that last night's performance from DeSantis? And I'm not just talking about Twitter, but also his appearance on Fox. Do you think it helped or hurt Trump? Good question.

You know, to see the typical big rally, Obama style. Kamala Harris had a great rollout, by the way. I don't know if you remember that. Even Donald Trump commented, Man, she's going to be good, and she ended up being terrible in the interview. I think that Santa says, I got a lot of money.

I got like six months. I don't have a carcass until January. Let me introduce myself, make it official, game on.

So he's going to do it differently. It was pointed out to me by Mark Thiessen, who was just on the show, that they got 6.5 million people. How many rollouts had 6.5 million people? That's who came on Twitter. And the reason it crashed, Elon Musk believes, is because the amount of people that came on the Twitter, that Twitter access.

I wouldn't have done it audio. I love audio, obviously, but I would have done it video. But then he looked good with Trey Gowdy. He ran through his policies, had an hour on the number one network in television. Casual, informed conversation, not sensationalistic.

So I am not against it. I'm open to not like to let let's to let's let's see what happens. Yes, okay. Change the subject. New York's Mayor, Eric Adams, he wants to suspend the right to shelter for migrants.

He says we can't afford the city can't guarantee housing for all of them any longer. When is New York going to ditch its sanctuary city status? He was on WABC this morning, one of our great affiliates with Sid Rosenberg this morning, and he talked about it. And he said, Sid, I didn't come up with these policies. I didn't write these laws.

I have to live with these laws. Nobody anticipated 44,000 people need to eat and sleep and can't work for a minimum of 120 days. This is not sustainable. This is what's brilliant about this. We've known this been a problem, Stuart, since the longest we've worked together.

This has been an issue.

Some people care about it, some people don't.

Some leaders make it a priority, others don't. But it's always been a priority. But until they started overwhelming liberal cities, which is every city, It became an issue now of national persuasion. In Chicago, they're in police stations. In New York, I went by the Roosevelt Hotel the other day.

It's already full. People just sitting outside. By the way, not starving. These are not famished people who dress well. They have decided they like our country better.

That's not what asylum was meant for. We know our countries better. You know our countries better. How many countries have you been to? That's not the way it works.

Right, it's not the way it works.

So at least he's going to try. Hopefully people will listen. They didn't listen to Adams on the bail law. Even though he begged to change it, he backed off.

Now he's got to continue with press conference after press conference, get other mayors to do exactly what he's doing. Yes, indeed. Brian, thanks a lot for joining us. See you again real soon. Go get him, Stuart.

All right, Alex, listen on WABC in Brooklyn. Hey, Alex. Hey, good morning, Brian. By the way, well, you were just talking about, you know, Mayor Eric Adams went down to the border and told them that he was going to treat them extremely well here in New York City.

So I wouldn't be surprised if so many of the people that are coming here, of these illegal immigrants, are coming here because they're picking the New York City buses that are coming in our direction because he told them he's going to treat them well. But I want to kind of say that. The Blessed City is one of the most attractive places to go in the country, in the world. Right. Mhm.

And especially with the kind of treatment he was promising them, he's going to give them good stuff. But I wanted to comment on Ron DeSantis two two points. I think, number one, the reason why he did the Twitter thing as opposed to having a live audience and having it live stream on all the television networks, which would have gotten in more viewers and a broader audience in terms of getting more Democrats and CNN and other platforms as well as Republicans was because I think he was afraid of getting less viewers on live television than what Trump got when he announced in Mar-a-Laga that he was running. And then Trump would come out and say, Hey, you're not as good as I am. People don't like you as much.

And that's why I got more people when I live streamed my announcement at Mar-a-Lago on live television. I also want to make another point quickly about Trump supporters. I feel like they're going into this. Election with way too many feelings and emotions about how they like Trump and how they're connected with him. What they need to do is they need to cut the crappy emotions and start thinking common sense and logically, and at least go into an open with an open mind and listen to the arguments that Ronda Santos is saying.

He's not terrible just because he's running against Trump. Listen to the arguments, listen to Trump's arguments. I know. But don't just say, hey, he's running against Trump. You've got to be an established Republican.

I know. Yeah, read their arguments. Be mature about it. Don't be emotional. Don't tell me I'm going to root for my team right or wrong.

Your vote's worth more than that. From high atop Fox News headquarters in New York City, always seeking solutions, never sowing division. It's Brian Killmead.

Hi everyone, Brian Kilman here. Thanks so much for listening all week long as we get set for Memorial Day. A look back at all those who served and gave so much for our country and the families they left behind. That's what Memorial Day is about, all these generations. We take note, we take pause, also use his time to really start summer in many ways.

This hour going to be joined by Jimmy Phela as well as Jennifer Griffin from the Pentagon. National Security, she handles it all. Kind of a big day today because we know this. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for now, Mark Milley, as well as Secretary of Defense Austin, will hold a press conference in, I guess, about 90 minutes, and they'll give us the state of everything with the Pentagon along with. Along with finding the latest in the Ukraine war.

So let's get to the big three.

Now with the stories you need to know, it's Brian's big three. Number three. We've been pretty darn clear that we don't support the use of U.S.-made equipment used for attacks inside Russia. We've been clear about that with the Ukrainians. There was an incursion inside Russia, and the question is who did it and what did they use?

That's John Kirby. Ukraine, things are changing. It looks like Ukraine may be attacking inside Russia, and the Wagner Group is predicting a Russian collapse. We'll give you the details. Number two.

We've offered a lot of concessions. The cap on the spending is a Democrat idea. The work requirement was a Democrat idea. I can't help it if the Democrats have become so extreme and now it's a party of Bernie Sanders. One thing about the Speaker, he is available.

One thing about the White House, they are not. With the debt default just days away, where does Joe go? The Oval Office, the East Room, Tri-Camp David, and their Rehoboth. Not really a reason to leave a very important overseas trip early. Number one.

I pledge to you that on January 20th, 2025, at high noon, that I'll be the guy on the west side of the Capitol with the left hand on the Bible and the right hand in the air taking the oath of office as the 47th President of the United States. No more excuses. And we are in 2023, so it's a long road. That's Governor DeSantis. Ryan finally runs.

DeSantis is officially in, and there things are clear. He has a gap to close versus Trump, and Twitter spaces need a lot of work because it crashed with him on it. What it means for the overall race, and why does Governor DeSantis beat Biden head to head, but yet Trump doesn't. Even though they're both within the margin of errors, let's bring in someone who has no errors, Jennifer Griffin. Jennifer, welcome back.

Uh Thanks, Brian.

So, what do you think today's press conference? Is it it for Millie? Is it his goodbye? No, Millie is going to be in the job of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs until October 1st. That, by law, it's a two two-year terms, and it ends on October 1st.

What we expect today from the White House is in the Rose Garden at about 1.45 p.m., we expect the President will nominate, and we've confirmed that he will nominate, General C.Q. Brown, who is currently the head of the Air Force. You know, as you know from the past, Brian, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs often rotates between the services because that is a joint position that is overseeing all the services. And it really was the Air Force's turn. But the President still had a choice of a number of people.

He chose General C.Q. Brown. It's an interesting choice. He will become, he was the first black head of the U.S. Air Force, and he will become the second black chairman of the Joint Chiefs after Colin Powell.

What's interesting about General Brown is his job before he became Air Force Chief, he was out in the Pacific overseeing the entire Air Fleet and Air Force component. Out in the Pacific.

So he's very familiar with Taiwan and the situation in the Pacific. But he also ran the ISIS air campaign over the Middle East. He's an F-16 pilot. He has 130 combat hours, 3,000 flight hours. And so he's going to be announced at the White House today.

But he will have to be confirmed by the Senate. That could be a problem because Senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama is holding up about 300 military nominations because he's upset that the Pentagon has changed policy and it will allow any female service members who need abortions and are posted in states where abortions are banned, they can take time off and travel to facilities if they, again, if they qualify and need that kind of reproductive health. And so right now there's a showdown where all of the military nominations are held up by Senator Tuberville. All right, let's talk about what's happening in Ukraine. A lot going on.

First off, do you believe the offensive has started for the Ukrainians? I think what you're seeing right now are shaping operations. I think it's very interesting. I woke up this morning and saw a video of the Russian Defense Ministry or a building used by the Defense Ministry that was on fire in Moscow. That comes just weeks after those two drones flew into Red Square, you know, near Red Square, hit the Kremlin or exploded above the Kremlin, making it look like there had been an attack on President Putin or the seat of power there.

You have, of course, as you were mentioning, the incursion into Belgorod, which is Russian territory on the border with Ukraine. There is some dispute as to whether any vehicles, armored vehicles that the U.S. had donated to Ukraine had been used in that strike. No indication that any Americans were involved. In that incursion.

But it's clear that these are psychological operations that are sort of trying to put pressure on Russia. And then you have the fact that the Wagner Group, the mercenaries, run by Yevgeny Prigozhin, who had basically emptied Russia's prisons and put prisoners out to fight as mercenaries on the front lines in Bakhmut, that he's withdrawing. He's going to hand over to the regular Russian forces. But those regular Russian forces, they are tired, they are ill-equipped, and they are not very professional.

So Ukraine says they're still going to try and keep Russia active and held down in Bakhmut. Bakhmut is strategically insignificant, but what's significant about it is if it ties up the Russian military, then that allows the Ukrainians to sort of move down to the south. And what they're going to want to try to do is to cut off that land bridge to Crimea. But I don't believe we've seen that start yet.

Well, it's fascinating what went on. I'm sure I'm not telling you. You anything you don't know, but in an interview, the head of the Wagner Group, the founder of the Wagner Group, came out and said he professed by love of his motherland and loyalty to Putin. He delivered a blistering criticism of the war, which the Kremlin calls a special military operation. Here's his comments through translation, and we can pick it up.

Cut 27.

Now with regard to demilitarization, if they had 500 tanks at the beginning of special military operation, now they have 5,000. If they had 20,000 able to fight, now they have 400,000 able to fight.

So how did we demilitarize? It turns out that on the contrary, we have militarized Ukraine. And he goes on. To talk about how the elites, the rich, are not letting their kids, those kids don't get drafted. Everybody else does, and they're dying.

200,000 casualties, 40,000 to 50,000 dead. What's the significance of that statement? This is very significant because what you're seeing is you're seeing the fault lines within Russian society, within the Russian military, and even within the Russian power structure. He may be professing Yevgeny Prigozhin, who's the head of the Wagner Group, was long time known as Putin's chef. And he may be saying that he's professing loyalty to Putin, but he's basically launching criticism not only at Putin because his military, his defense secretary, his top generals have not been able to deliver a swift defeat in Ukraine and in fact have, in his own words, and this is an amazing admission, Ukraine is now militarized and able to stand up to Russia.

So you're going to see this fault line play out. You're going to see Progozhin make a play, I think, within the Kremlin and maybe even at Putin. The question is, how long does Progozhin survive making statements like that? Will Putin use his statements? You know, is Putin still amused by Progozhin and going to use those statements to reshuffle his generals?

He's done that several times to no effect. He put General Garasimov, who was supposed to be his top advisor and general, in charge of the battlefield, and there's been no progress. It's been a complete stalemate in the last few months since he's been in charge.

So the question is, how does Putin shuffle the deck? Today, there's a diversion. There was an announcement that Putin and the Belarusian president, neighboring president, Lukashenko, had agreed to allow Russia to put nukes on Belarusian territory closer to Europe. That is a diversion. Whenever Putin's doing badly on the battlefield, you hear him start talking about nukes or moving nukes around.

Yeah. Right. Uh this offensive looks promising, doesn't it? I think anything, any time that observers and Western observers and even the Pentagon and others have underestimated the Ukrainians, they've overperformed. They thought that they would be finished within two weeks and that the capital would fall.

The Ukrainians have outmaneuvered the Russians. They've trained faster on all of the weapon systems, whether it's the Patriot missile systems that have been used in a very unique way. The training goes very quickly with the Ukrainians. I've heard that time and again from people in the US military and in the Pentagon who have been part of that training process. If normally it takes six months to train on an M1 Abrams tank, they're doing it in a few weeks.

So this is impressive. And now you're hearing that the U.S. is planning to, U.S. and Netherlands and Denmark are planning to train the Ukrainians on F-16 fighter jets. That was unthinkable a few months ago.

Those Jets will most likely not be a part of this counteroffensive, but it shows the long-term investment in Ukraine's future and Ukraine's defense. Does it frustrate many people, the pace in which we do things? They're not going to get high Mars, they get high Mars, they're not going to get Patriots, they get Patriots, they're not going to get tanks, they're going to get tanks.

Now they're not going to get F sixteens, they're going to get F sixteen. I mean, it does seem as though we can't make up our minds and we're slowly giving them what they need, but how many people die in the interim?

So I think if you're Ukrainian and you're on the front lines or you're President Zelensky, you're incredibly frustrated. You know that the U.S. has also been the main leader in terms of stepping up. In fact, as we speak right now, Brian, there is what's known as the contact group meeting virtually with Defense Secretary Austin set this up with the 30 NATO countries and allies to get those allies every six weeks or so to donate more weaponry.

So that is happening as we speak here in the Pentagon, and that's what we'll hear more about at the 1230 press conference today. I think there probably is frustration inside Ukraine, and you sort of feel like, well, if NATO had just come in and given and gone toe-to-toe with Russia, this would have been over in two weeks.

However, let's take the full context. And remember, the U.S. is having to lead a very it's very important that the NATO coalition hold together, that the EU hold together. When you deal with that many allies, you've got a lot of different considerations. And the biggest consideration is that in the beginning, nobody knew that the U.S.

is the U. How Putin would react with the nuclear weapons. That kept people moving cautiously and slowly. And that's why you keep seeing these incremental increases: you realize that Putin really, every time he Takes a step back and loses something on the battlefield, you realize that he's not really going to be capable. Of the swagger and the nuclear saber rattling, it's still a factor.

I mean, this is still a country that has nuclear weapons, and it's not clear that Putin would not use them.

So it's a delicate dance. Ukraine is still standing, and Ukraine has a real shot in the next few months. But these next few months are going to be crucial on the battlefield. And that's why the U.S. and others have rushed so many things, whether it's the tiger tanks that Germany gave.

You never expected Germany to take the lead on that. They did. The U.S. gave them cover with the M1 Abrams, but those M1 Abrams are not really going to be a big factor on the battlefield. That was to give cover to the NATO allies so they could give the Tiger tanks.

Understood. And Jennifer, I can't wait to you come on, and the big debate will be: should they talk before or after they go for Crimea or not? That would be a good debate. But when you have 17% of Ukraine and people say, let's do peace talks, how does that even happen? Because it.

Ukraine can't give up half their country. Yeah. The only people talking about peace talks right now are really the Chinese and maybe the French leadership, but the Ukrainians are not talking about that. They want an opportunity to win back more of their territory. They're not going to stop.

Even if they can't retake Crimea, that is going to be frozen there, and the world is not going to recognize that as Russian territory. And so right now, the next few months, the focus needs to be on how to regain as much territory as possible and to bleed Russia out on the battlefield. Jennifer Griffin, last question. 16 minutes did a feature on how the Pentagon's being gouged because we have so few weapons manufacturers. They have no choice.

They charge what they want. A lot of inspectors have been fired, let go, not renewed. What's the reality? Is the Pentagon being gouged by American companies? Look, I think the acquisition system here in the Pentagon has been broken since I've seen it firsthand for the past 15 years.

You've got, just like we saw with supply chains during COVID and afterwards, the disruptions, the slowness, but also the requests by the Pentagon for these kind of weapon systems where they tack on so many components that the weapons makers themselves, it just takes forever. But also, let's look at the fact that the budget process on Capitol Hill, you never have a budget on time, passed on time. And so those weapons manufacturers and those contracts, they wait and see if they're going to have the money and if they're going to have the budget, and that slows things down. We heard the Defense Secretary talk about how if this debt ceiling crisis continues and you don't have a budget, you're going to be delaying the building of shipbuilding in particular will be harmed. There are submarines that are nuclear.

Submarines that are in the process of being built, that the whole process gets slowed down because of this budget process on Capitol Hill. And somebody is going to have to figure out how to have five-year budgets passed or something for the Pentagon so that weapons manufacturers can know what they're dealing with on the horizon. Because you know, in manufacturing, you can't plan if you don't know if you have money. All that stuff is true, and I'm just wondering also, and they talk about an oil filter only being made by one company, how much it actually costs, how much it should cost, and that type of stuff. I'm going to be naive.

I think there should be a patriotic spirit while making a profit. I just think that you should not be able to sleep at night if you're gouging your own country. Final thought? I used to call it war profiteering. War profiteering.

It should be illegal. It's treasonous. But it goes back to the Reagan era when you had the, you know, what was it, a $1,000 hammer that the Pentagon was buying? This has been a problem here for so long.

Somebody's got to get their arms around it. Common sense so that the American people have faith that the money that they are giving for the defense budget is being used wisely. These weapons, you know, we've seen firsthand how incredible these weapons are on the battlefield. Even the old ones need to be some common sense. Jennifer Griffin, you're the best.

Thanks so much, Jennifer. Back in a moment. The more you listen, the more you'll know it's Brian Killmead. Hey, welcome back everybody. In a little while, we're going to be joined by Jimmy Fayela.

He's got to come in because he has the studio's right by here. He has no choice. A lot of people are riding. People talk about the latest polls. Continues to everyone continues to talk about the rollout last night.

That did not really work on Twitter space. Other people say that it was no big deal. It's good to be different. Other people are writing me with the latest polls. They show Trump up 42 in Iowa.

We'll see about that when it comes out. Let's just see it. My thing is: no matter what the polls are now, even if DeSantis was up to 20 points. I would say, guys, just got to relax. Because this thing's got to play out.

You got to get on the ground. You got to make speeches. You got to do interviews. You got to answer some questions. You got to figure out who the mistakes are going to be and how big those mistakes are, what the ads are going to be like, and who's going to be taking on who.

Now, you got Tim Scott extremely competent. Governor Haley with a great team. You have Asa Hutchinson who knows what he's doing. He's not going to get more than 2% or 3%. Vivek Ramaswamy is going to change the conversation.

He's already tries to raise the voting age and going into the inner cities to demand Republicans follow him there into Chicago and New York and other places.

So each candidate will force others to react. It's not just Trump and DeSantis. And I think you're crazy to sleep on Tim Scott. And Nikki Haley. They are so different.

And if people start mudding each other up on the Trump Republican side, they will step forward. Because I don't know anybody that has a bad thing to say about that knows Tim Scott. Uh has anything bad to say about Tim Scott? If you're interested in it, Brian's Talking About It. You're with Brian Kilmead.

I actually did not know what 990s were before all of this happened.

Something's being weaponized against us that many people don't even know and honestly don't care about. The accountant handled that, like, I don't know what that is. It is such a trip now to hear the word, the the f the the term 990s. I'm like, ugh, it's like triggering. Patrice Cullers, who was one of the leaders of Black Lives Matter, now no one wants to hit up the organization.

Why?

Because they had $100 million.

Now they have $9 million and they haven't paid any taxes. Smells very familiar with Jimmy. Very familiar, Jimmy, right? Jimmy Fay. Fayla joins us right now.

Have you ever had $100 million, woken up and realized you had $9? No, but I didn't run an organization, BLM, that stands for Buy Large Mansions. No kidding.

So I would have. I don't know. Have you ever seen more people look at this organization and say, yeah, I'm not running that? More people, no one wants to run it, no one has run it, they don't know what it is. We knew it was a racket from word one.

I mean, you can tell they got to where they were as a it was a shakedown, it was a grift, just based on the sound bite you just played. They've been hiding behind like woke word salad. Like, this is triggering. What's the implication there that it's racist to make black people pay taxes? Don't even bring it up again.

I've been audited twice in like the last five years, by the way. Right. I didn't have the option of getting on the phone and being like, you know, I'm a little triggered here, so I'm just going to hold on to the money now. How do you think Trump feels? I believe he has been raided?

Yeah, he's been raided. They arrest his lawyer. They flipped another one of his lawyers to turn on his client. And remember what they're doing with the Trump organization. They're accusing him of false expenses.

Oh, yeah.

Well, they put his CFO in jail. How about that?

Well, to be fair, though, in the Stormy Daniels case, he did pay her by a check, and she's supposed to get paid in singles. Right. Which is a problem. You got to be mindful. Right.

You have to be willing to criticize yourself when you make a mistake. There's no doubt about it. Good to see you, man.

So, yeah, it's good to see you.

So, this is one of those things that's happening now, but it ruined for everything because most people, you know, if they want to, they could help. You look at what's happening in the inner city, you see single-parent families. If I, if you think to yourself, man, I'd love to help those kids. Yes, I think I'd love to help the next generation. And then you give some money, and you're talking, I saw Jennifer Edison give over a million dollars.

Big deal, right?

So, and where you go, where is it? And that's the thing. There's no pushback from any of these corporations.

Well, because one, They don't want to, I mean, what's the implication for them? If the corporations go, hey, what happened to the money? We're going after this organization. They get hit with the so what?

So do Black Lives Not Matter now? I mean, that was the effectiveness of this scrift: they shook down every corporation, they shook down every celebrity, but there's no actual follow-up in terms of. Where this money went. Again, as you said, most of these people donated in good faith. The corporations did.

That was a shakedown, it was an electoral summer. The Democrats piggybacked off of this movement pretty aggressively. But there has been no deliverable. You know what I'm saying? Like, where is the outcry that there was no scholarship fund?

Or maybe in a failing inner city school? And talk about the craziness. Do you remember you better have six feet apart? You better not go outside. Yeah.

Got to wear a mask outside. But when Anthony Fauci was viewing the riots in the streets, because no, they're keeping their testimony.

Well, this is where they see a problem while burning down a city. But you've got to understand, COVID. Probably made in a Chinese lab, understands that when you're looting a Chinese Nike store, okay, there's some type of DNA alignment. Oh, I know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Have you talked to Tr. Tomony McCarry? Oh, McCarry. He does come on my show. McCarry comes on and dumbs it down.

Right, we talk about it. Because he understands that Anthony Fauci's a fraud. Oh, it's a total scam. But again, that's where people, like, there's been so much damage done. To the trust and institutions in this country, and the odd part.

Is that the people lecturing the most about protecting the integrity of these institutions are the ones destroying them? Like when you talk about the DOJ. What was the big criticism on conservatives when we were questioning the Mueller probe? Oh, they're undermining faith in the DOJ. But what did we come to know?

We shouldn't have had any faith to begin with. But it's the people yelling. You're undermining democracy, said the people who made up the Russian collusion hoax.

So let's talk about Hunter Biden. I love it. Right? And the fact is, we brought up this last night on the five. What is it with Hunter?

Hunter College, Hunter Biden. There's always a problem. If someone's named Hunter, just turn yourself in. It doesn't end up. Right.

It turns out, though, this woman might get away with it. She turns herself in and gets a misdemeanor.

Well, she had a machete at somebody's neck, who happened to be a reporter. And then went out to stalk him after he left the building. Still have no idea what he could be charged. She could be charged. But this is the kind of insanity we've created.

People like her did that without ever once thinking it could cost her her job. Because up until now, you know, they've supported people like this. Colleges, remember this: Stanford law. Had a member of the Trump administration out there to speak. They literally attacked an invited guest like a judge.

Like he was a villain on a daytime talk show. You ain't all that. I'm like, no, that's not what he was here to do. But evidently, the equity manager officer was there to say, listen, it's not fair to these kids to have you talk, really? Yeah.

Because she was appointed by Trump. And it was an invited guest. Think about Riley Gaines at San Francisco Stage. He got barricaded into a classroom. Right.

And there is no actual retribution for these people.

So that's kind of the environment they've created. She thought, oh, it's a machete. Is it a little much? Maybe I should have gone with a smaller knife. But she's not thinking I should have pulled no knife at all.

That's the problem.

So her name is. Reuven Fenton, excuse me, the reporter is Reuven Fenton, and he sees what happened when Shelly Ann Rodriguez did this at Hunter when she spotted pro life students with a stack table and brochures. Unite educated. This is Propaganda. What are you going to do?

Like anti-trans and active? Is that what you're going to do next? Yeah, wait, what? This is violent. You're tripping my students.

There's a word again. baby.

So you don't even know what that means. Whoa, whoa, whoa! Whoa! She wrecks the place. Don't let me jump in here, though, because she said, What's next?

Anti-trans stuff? Yeah. And then what did she say to him? You can't even have babies. Hey, that's anti-trans.

Hold on a second.

Now you're a fan.

Now you're a transphobia.

Now she's the trans phobe now. Who let J.K. Rowling into the room? Oh, this is nuts. It's so dumb.

So, this woman wasn't done. Later on that day, she goes home after this goes viral. And this is how this went out.

Now, I try to put this together. Reuven Fenton is a reporter in the New York Post. He thought he'd knock on her door and see if she wants to give her side of the story at Hunter. Let's listen. We just wanted to speak to this woman.

We thought we might have a chance, given that she's obviously passionate about her beliefs, and maybe if we showed up to her door, she'd be willing to grant us an interview. You know, in my career, I've knocked on 10,000 doors, you know, hoping for interviews, and once in a while you got one, and I thought this might work out. But I got a bit of a surprise when she opened the door. This was a first for me. She at first verbally threatened to chop us up with the machete, and then proceeded to come out of her apartment brandishing the blade and pressing it against the side of my neck for about a second.

And then she saw that she was being taped. Can you imagine if the guy was enrolling on this? If he's not rolling on that, she's still employed. But again, although she gets fired, okay, there's a thousand of her in academia right now, probably ten thousand.

Somebody who has that same type of like DEI mentality of we need people that'll come into our campus and tell the kids the whole country is racist and then charge them eight hundred thousand dollars for the privilege of being told so.

So, yeah. I'm telling you, I used to make fun of myself for going to community college, but there's nothing smarter you could do with your money. Than get at least two years of transferable credits for next to nothing and not leave hating America. Right. And you don't, because you get in, you get out, these teachers are not trying to win you over on campus.

They know you usually have another job on the side. Yep. You're leaving.

Okay.

They make sure you get back and forth to Nickelbeer Night Safe. And they let you have your education. That's it. Shout out to Community College, Nassau Community, if you're listening. And I know you are.

Well, when I was graduating, they had Farmingdale or Nassau. Yep. Now, Farmdale went four years. Yeah, Farmingdale went big. Right.

So now they're eligible to get illegal immigrants. Like Stony Brooks got them too. Yeah. Congratulations. Do you want to laugh?

Hofstra, great school. A lot of Fox execs went. My sister went.

Okay.

I got to speak at Hofstra to their broadcast journalism majors about getting a job in broadcasting. And it was my favorite thing in the world. I said, well, you're going to want to start by walking across the street to the community college where I went. And the administrators are like, oh, Jimmy, would you look at the time? Thanks for coming, pal.

But it was funny. They were good people. But they were good. And they said you had an unorthodox way on these. I did.

Yeah. You know, and you could say what you want about taking hostages and low-level extortion attempts, but no. I went to community college. Obviously, I was driving a cab. I was doing stand-up.

And I got in the door here at Fox's. They just booked me to be a guest on Kennedy. That's how we kind of got this ball rolling. And then I just got good at sneaking on to set. You know, it's live TV.

Once you're in the shot, they're not going to pull you out. That's terrible for them. And this is terrible advice to kids. This is the worst TED Talk ever. That's funny.

Bro, so listen, I was going to talk about it. Let's just do this real quick. There's another whistleblower that's come forward. I was stunned. I was flipping around last night, waiting for you to come on Hattede, and I saw Anderson Cooper.

Tossed to a reporter, and they talked about the second whistleblower in the Hunter Biden case. Then I find out CBS talked to Gary Shapley about what he saw.

So notice I'm noticing other people outside Fox cut 28. In January 2020, he was assigned to what he calls a high-profile investigation. Who's the subject of the investigation? I can't confirm or deny the subject of this investigation. Why not?

Because, you know, part of the tax secrecy laws don't allow it. Shapley can't say it. But CBS News has learned the investigation was the probe of Hunter Biden by the Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney in Delaware. Senior Biden administration officials have vowed to let it run its course without interference.

But CBS News has obtained this letter Shapley's lawyers sent to Congress Monday, alleging irregularities in DOJ's handling of the investigation. Shapley is seeking legal protections from Congress so he can share specifics of his allegations. Your reaction. Number one, Merrick Carlin is as corrupt as his days. Oh, what a scam.

Am I right? And this agent, okay, he knew something was up when they started telling him they felt triggered by his weaponizing this line of questioning. It was very shades of BLM. This is where the liability presents itself for Biden.

Okay.

As you know, he's historically unpopular within his own party.

Okay.

He has gotten this far because the media has kind of covered for him. They did his campaigning in 2020. And although they kicked the tires about getting him out of there, you know, in the run-up to the midterms, he exceeded expectations. The media kind of laid off.

Okay.

But this is a media that would be willing to out him in this brief window they have should an alternative present itself because they really don't feel confident going to the polls with him. You saw it. 36% approval, 33% think he's a strong agent. I mean, right now, you're legitimately handing out cruise brochures to people who are on the lifeboats from the Titanic. You know, it's a hard sell right now.

They're still shivering from getting off the head to head that he still beats Trump within the margin of error. And that gives them hope.

Well, what gives them hope is: yes, Trump leading in the primaries by as much as he does because he could beat Trump. Because Trump, they can turn out an anti-Trump. Do you believe that Biden can beat Trump? I believe he can. I'm not saying he would, but he can't beat anybody.

But Trump. Because the thing is, Trump turns out for the Democrats an anti-Trump vote.

Okay, they'll vote anti-Trump in your, in like literally your county comptroller. I don't even know what the guy does, but if you run one ad that says he'll stand up to Trump, you get like 60% Democrat turnout off that alone.

So that's where Trump is challenged: there's an anti-Trump vote out there that doesn't exist yet at the level that it does for a DeSantis or a Scott. They're certainly going to try. I mean, they're throwing everything at DeSantis. And if heaven forbid Tim Scott gets a nomination, which is a comedian I would like to see happen, only because they will continue to call him the white supremacist. And that's the funniest thing in the world.

Well, I love that. I think it was Ali Elder that came out. He was the blackface of white supremacist. This is the thing. If all these guys are white supremacists, there's like a typo in the handbook.

I'm going to be honest with you. We've got to get the publisher on the phone. Who edited this thing? Right. Did you see Vanity Fair's headline?

Unbelievable. Yeah. He said, well, Elon Musk will interview Ron DeSantis because David Duke was not available. Where did that come from? You just tried to hit it out of the park.

In spring training. You should wait for the election. You're not supposed to. You don't even know about it. They say in comedy kill me that you don't open with your closer.

Yeah. Okay, that is not an opening line. That's a closer. Right. But you basically said, for a business perspective, you just basically told.

50% of your audience. Don't touch Vanity Fair. Yeah. So instead of like, wow, Vanity Fair's got some good story.

Now it's a waste of time. Isn't it so crazy, though, that all of the people in these departments prioritize everything except the customer? Right. I mean, it used to be like the customer's always right.

Now it's like, ah, the customer's always a racist. Trick at them. It's like having a room full of people as a waiter and a bartender and just ignoring them. Yeah. I'm here to impress my manager.

All right, let's take a break, Jim, come out, and find out what Jimmy Fela is going to be doing the rest of the day. Are you doing anything? Don't answer. That was a trick. Cliffhanger.

Back in the moment. Want even more, Brian? Download the podcast at BrianKillMeadShow.com every episode. Exclusive interviews on demand. More of Kill Mead coming up.

Radio that makes you think. This is the Brian Kill Me Show. Nancy leading the way, you never had to worry about whether the bill would pass. She said she had the boats. She had the boats every time.

She had votes so many. Life-changing piece of legislation. She helped rescue the economy in the Great Depression. Yeah. Right, the Great Depression.

She saw the Great Depression. FDR has gotten so much credit. Jimmy Phela, who wrote the article, did you write a column? The Depression. Stop giving the FDR the credit.

Was that the headline?

Well, to be fair, I do believe Biden and Pelosi were both in government at the time of the Great Depression. He was born at the Great Depression right at that time. Stock market crash at 29. But I mean, you have no idea what he's going to say on a regular basis. Shame on everybody pretending this is okay.

Like, 32% of the people don't think he's mentally fit to serve now.

So we're going to do this to the guy for another four years. Like, it's actually cruel of us. Where's his wife?

Well, you know where she is. She's doing magazine shoots and, you know, enjoying being the president. She likes this gig, clearly likes being the president, and that's what you've got to hope. You've got to hope that if he wins a second term, Jill's a better president with a little more experience.

So Kamala Harris was supposed to be the heir apparent that gave a sense of competency, right? Yeah, yeah. Whatever you think of Elizabeth Warren, nobody thinks she's old or incompetent. You just don't like her views. Yes.

That's not the story with Harris. Harris blew the deal because she's. Not good. She's not smart. She doesn't hustle.

She doesn't read. She doesn't prepare. Nothing. That's what blew this deal. Yes.

And what's so funny about it is the Democrats tried to warn the rest of the country. Don't ever forget, she ran. She ran for the presidency and dropped out of the Democratic primaries before the first vote was cast in the Iowa caucuses. Like that is the political equivalent of passing out at 11 o'clock on New Year's Eve. You don't even make the ball drop.

You're the one in the bathroom. And we were talking about this in the break: that you didn't love DeSantis' rollout. A lot of people don't. But the one thing we know had a great rollout, Kamala Harris. Great speech.

Even Trump was like, she's going to be good. Give her that. She's going to be good. Attorney General, senator from California, look out. Tough questioner of Kavanaugh.

And then the problem is she didn't study at all on health care, on immigration, just didn't have any answers. The next day, she was working things back. Everybody quit on her. Her precursor was happening as vice president.

So I love talking to people like you about what you think is going to happen between Trump and DeSantis. And most people say nothing will change about Trump. Governor Huckabee weighed in last night on the show you were on. Cut 10. It's a long way before anybody even votes in a caucus or primary.

So there's a lot of time for things to happen. Ron DeSantis clearly steps into the race in the number two slot, but it's a distant number two. And what Ron DeSantis does not have at this point is a fanatically loyal base of people who are as fanatically loyal to him as they are to Donald Trump. Trump's base is unmovable. In fact, Trump's base is growing.

And in large part, the more the media and the government, but that's now become all one, the more they try to discredit. And we find out about the lies and the criminal activity they've done to him and against him, I think the stronger it makes him. He says his base is growing. Do you agree with what Huckabee's saying? No, this is where I respectfully disagree with Huckabee.

I think people who are active consumers of politics realize Trump has been railroaded. But I think the casual fan is looking at a bigger picture and that they associate Trump with a lot of his perceived liabilities, whether they're fair or unfair.

So I think Trump has to, to change the narrative, just has to show us a better side of his personality. Where do we see you on stage? Oh, come on. Davenport, Iowa, June the 3rd, Mesa, Arizona, June the 10th, Lexington, Kentucky, June the 24th. Where do we get this if we didn't jot that down?

Go to foxacrossamerica.com or listen to me on the radio after you on the Fox News app. Jimmy Faylor, thanks so much. You're ready. Listen to the show ad-free on Fox News Podcast Plus, on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music with your Prime membership, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Mm.