Democrats begin piling on Biden: Time to drop out

From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest growing radio talk show. Brian Kilmead.

Well, just a little bit of fake news there because we are doing the show this morning from the great city of St. Louis. Good morning, this is Mark Reardon filling in for Brian just on this President's Day. He's going to be gone the rest of the week. I will tell you this: you know, I do a radio show here on the afternoon in St.

Louis on 971 FM Talk. KFTK and Ryan is on with me every single week. I think people listen to his show know he's like the hardest working guy in all of media.

So, truth be told, I had I used to be in a situation on the radio, I never got all the holidays off, like even Memorial Day, 4th of July, because it was a situation where I was in the union SAG AFTRA.

So, then that changed, and I get like days like President's Day off. And then this invite came up, and Brian and the team invited me to fill in. And, you know, I thought, man, I'm getting my President's Day holiday robbed from me, but I'm doing it for Killmead. And he's so good to me. I'm glad to be here.

But. I just as a cautionary tale here, I I usually do afternoon radio, so the wake up period for me, I ease into the day. And I guess I say that because if anything happens along these lines this morning, you can just kind of blame it on sleep deprivation. He said if an ally did not pay their dues, He'd encouraged Russia to, quote, do whatever the hell they want. Yeah, this is the president from the other day.

That's a long pause here. You might hear some of those from me if I get confused. Still going. I guess I should clear my mind here a little bit, not say what I'm really thinking. But let me be clear.

This is an outrageous thing for the President to say. I can't fathom. Can't fathom from Truman on, they're rolling over their graves here and there.

Okay, well, I kind of want to focus on the fact that I can't fathom that once again, Joe Biden keeps getting confused. We had all the people that came out last week with the talking points defending himself, and then it happened again, you know, over the weekend. Here's Joe Biden, cut eight.

So, the idea that we're going to walk away from. Ukraine. The idea that they're going to let NATO begin to split is totally against the interest of the United States of America.

So it's about time we make sure that Congress come home and pass the legislation funding NATO. Yeah, it seems like every day he can't put things together and does get very confused.

So we're going to talk about that. Josh Krausauer is coming up here in just a couple of minutes, but I wanted to get to two other pieces of audio. One from Michigan, and I'm very curious about this. You had Rashida Talib up in Michigan, one of the squad members. We have one of those here in St.

Louis and Corey Bush that we're kind of trying to get rid of. But Talib said this. She's encouraging Democrats in the Michigan primary, which is coming up, to vote.

Well, not for Joe Biden. This is the way you can raise our voices. Don't make us even more invisible. Right now, we feel completely neglected and just unseen by our government. If you want us to be louder, then come here and vote uncommitted.

Wow.

So we'll talk with Josh about that. But then I guess all the buzz this weekend from the Trump side was about shoes cut 18. I just want to tell you, you know, I've wanted to do this for a long time. I have some incredible people that work with me on things and they came up with this and this is something I've been talking about for 12 years, 13 years. And I think it's going to be a big success.

Your influences have been very positive. They've been real influences and they love it and they love what we've done. That's the real deal. And we're going to remember the young people and We're gonna remember sneaker con, you know that. We're going to remember the young people, the young people especially that wear sneakers, right?

Well, we had the big ruling against the former president on Friday, $355 million. These new sneakers, the never-surrender footwear at SneakerCon, $399. I am most confident that our first guest here, Fox News Radio, political analyst, editor-in-chief of the Jewish Insider, my friend Josh Crosser. I've known him for a long time, with us this morning on the Brian Kilmead Show. Josh, how are you?

Good Monday to you. Happy President's Day. Happy President's Day. Great to be with you on Fox News Radio. It's kind of a convergence of the two shows that I'm on most regularly.

So it's good to be your voice here on President's Day.

Well, thank you very much. Let me just ask you to kind of get this out of the way about the shoes. And, you know, obviously, I was listening, monitoring, poking around, listening to a little CNN this morning, and they were already going off on the shoes and how ridiculous that was. These are things that this former president does from time to time, but what do you make of it? And obviously, the timing sort of is coordinated with what happened on Friday afternoon with the judgment, Josh.

Yeah, look, I'm old enough that I remember when Trump, as a candidate in 2016, was. selling Trump stakes at Mar-a-Lago during during the Florida primary.

So, you know, this is who he is. He's a marketer. Extraordinaire. That's how he, you know, I think that's his, frankly, his claim to fame, not less as a businessman, mostly as sort of someone who can promote his brand and promote his products. It is a little interesting that he's doing this sort of.

Sort of shameless shoe promotion after the verdict, where he's, if the appeal is not successful, he. Could lose a very, very significant chunk of his fortune. Maybe he's hard-pressed for cash and trying to add a little extra money for the legal bills coming up down the road. But it is a little bit off-brand or off. Of Kilter when you're having a big presidential campaign up and you're in Philadelphia selling shoes, getting booted a little bit, I heard, I think, in the audience.

Yeah. But look, he is about, you know, making sure that, you know, he, you know, he's selling the brand, always reselling, and making money.

So that's pretty much the Trump ethos in a nutshell.

Well, and, you know, I don't know. Part of this settlement on Friday, too, is he can't get loans. There's a lot of restrictions. I don't know what you think about the settlement overall. And obviously, Josh, I think that's going to end up in territory where there's appeals.

But, you know, once again, we have a situation where this stuff becomes such white noise. And, you know, we can talk about every day there's something new in this news cycle. And on Thursday, well, I guess it was Wednesday and Thursday or Thursday and Friday, you had everything going on with Fonnie Willis down in Fulton County.

So it's like a crazy chessboard where this is happening in New York. You have whatever's happening in Florida. You have whatever's happening in Atlanta. And no one seems to really care, certainly on the Republican side, because his numbers keep growing. Yeah, the the more pressure placed on Trump legally only helps him politically, at least within the m Republican primary, the Republican nomination battle, which is all but over.

But even among general election polling, you I've been looking at the numbers pretty closely and there hasn't been movement at all away from Trump since since Trump has faced these negative legal decisions, most most recently with the The decision to pony up over $300 million on account of financial fraud.

So, you know, this is the kind of we've seen this game before. I feel like it's Groundhog Day. It's not President's Day. It's always Groundhog Day when it comes to Trump. You know, you think that there's a big scandal, there's a big controversy or a big legal decision.

And ultimately, the fundamentals still are what's driving this election, and people have made up their minds and not changing their view of Trump no matter what's going on in the news. Josh, what is Nikki Haley doing right now? Let me play this a little audio. Obviously, the other thing the former president's doing is campaigning a little bit for RNC chair, and I want to ask you about that. Laura Trump's name has been mentioned.

Nikki Haley hitting Trump, saying, No, this is just him trying to take all the money and put it into the campaign. And that's not what the RNC's role should be. Every single penny will go to the number one and the only job of the RNC. That is electing Donald J. Trump as President of the United States.

So, is that the one and only job of the RNC? Electing Donald Trump President of the United States? Is that where every penny should go? I assume you don't agree with that. I mean, it should be a wake-up call for Republicans all over this country.

I mean, you look at the fact that we saw in his campaign reports that he used $50 million of campaign contributions to pay for his personal court cases. Then he tried to get the RNC to name him the presumptive nominee. We don't anoint kings in America. But, Josh, you know, the thing is with Nikki, nobody's really paying attention to that messaging. Again, except for the Democrats.

So, what is she doing here?

South Carolina is this Saturday. She's going to get smoked. We've been asking this question for a long time. Can she hang in there and have those results? She keeps talking like there's some sort of realistic path here.

I just don't see a realistic path in any way, shape, or form. Yeah, well, Trump is like a king in the Republican Party. He he's on no matter where you stand, I mean, he's dominating the party like no one we've seen in quite some time. Look, what is Haley's end game is a big big question. I think Initially, uh I think we're gonna look at South Carolina as the end game that if she couldn't win her home state, that would have been tough to imagine her going on from there.

But she's spending time actually. If you look at her travel schedule, Mark, she was in California, she's been in Michigan, Virginia is on on the schedule coming up. Um she is playing for delegates, like she's not gonna win any states perhaps, but she is trying to mount the challenge and mount the you know, frankly, be the representative of sort of the traditional Republican party that's now in decline, that that that she represents, that a whole lot of r you know, prominent Republicans in Washington still represent, even though Trump has has basically taken over the party. Um I I would not be well, I would be surprised but not shocked. if her name comes up In the context of no labels, uh, say they missed out on Larry Hogan, they missed out on um Joe Manchin over the over the last week.

Look, Haley makes the on paper and I and she may not want to burn any bridges with the Republican party, so she may and she said she's not interested, but If she could want to keep going on and on and on and basically burn the bridges with the Trump folks. With the nominee. She's declined to say over the weekend she's going to endorse Trump if he's the nominee. You know, I think there's a pathway if she wants to go third party. She actually would be a Better position than any of the other names we've been talking about, whether it's Manchin Hogan, Chris Christie.

Like, she actually could be a factor in the three-way race because she has the national visibility from a presidential campaign and she has credibility with a good chunk of Republicans, which very few of those other folks have. Yeah, but Josh, you have questions about RFK and what he might pull from. You know, different people have different opinions about his candidacy and where the numbers would pull from. I think both, you know, Trump and Biden. With Nikki, I don't know that there'd be a lot, maybe independent middle-of-the-road voters that would swing both ways, but seemingly those votes would be taken away again from Trump.

Mostly, wouldn't they? I think it could go both ways. I mean, that's what makes her sort of an interesting candidate because even though her numbers have taken a hit with the Trump, the MAGA voters, she's still, you know, you look at even the polls that show her getting crushed. She's getting like 35% of the vote in South Carolina, about 20% of the vote among Republicans, the Republican primary voters nationally.

So you do the math. You get 20% of Republicans, you get like 35% of Independents, then you get the Democrats that are really panicked about Biden's age. And, you know, I don't think it's likely, but you could see the constituency there for someone who represents sort of the more moderate, you know, Say moderate, more traditional wing of the Republican Party that can actually pick up some Democrats concerned about Biden's health. And by the way, Biden's promoting Haley a lot these days. You know, the Biden campaign loved having Haley out there attacking Trump, but you know, that could also set her up for getting more support if she decided to go that third-party route.

I don't think it's look, the big, the biggest obstacle, Mark, on that front is ballot access.

So she would have a challenging time at this late stage if she decided to go that direction. I don't think it's likely, but boy, she's she, if you had to pick a name out of like fantasy politics and say who's got the best chance to really mount the third-party run, I would, I would say, I think I would agree with that. Josh Crossauer, Fox News radio political analyst, editor-in-chief of the Jewish Insider.

So I played that cut from Rashida Talib at the start of the show, Josh. She's basically telling people, Democrats in Michigan, which is a very important state if Joe Biden wants to win reelection, to come to the Democrat primary in Michigan and vote uncommitted. Don't vote for this president, right? What do you make of that? Yeah, well, she is burning a lot of bridges within the Democratic Party.

It's interesting how the Biden folks. Reacted to Dean Phillips versus Rashida Talib, that they basically actively took on Dean Phillips, attacked him, dismissed him as a total nobody. With Talib, they are worried about that left-wing radical base. I mean, this is part of the challenge that the Democrats face into November. If you look at the polling data, there was a great poll out of Michigan that Fox News did last week, and it shows that.

It's a close race in Michigan, but Biden is bleeding support among the base, among Arab Americans, among black voters. The left is not on his side. A lot of it has to do with the war, Israel's war against Hamas. But you have this radical faction. I don't think Talib represents a whole lot of people, but they're very vocal.

They're very outspoken. They're disrupting events. They're disrupting transportation in cities across the country. And now she's trying to disrupt the nomination process and try to make a showing on the primary in Michigan. We saw this in New Hampshire, Mark.

There was a similar action by anti-Israel, pro, you know, Palestinian activists trying to get a writing campaign for ceasefire in New Hampshire, and it got a tiny percentage of the vote.

So it'll be interesting to see if, like, this will be an interesting test to how large that constituency really is in Michigan. I don't think it's very large, but we'll see what kind of momentum Talib has. Yeah, meantime, and you know this, Mark Veardon, fill in for Brian. I'm in St. Louis, and you have this other squad member in Corey Bush, who is facing a challenge now from our St.

Louis County prosecutor. And there was some polling that came out last week. That showed that Wesley Bell, who's the prosecutor, was doing quite well.

Now, I think that polling was inflated a little bit, but it looks like Corey Bush is in trouble. All right, 30 seconds. Last question. Josh and I talk baseball a lot. New baseball uniform controversy.

Go.

Well, first of all, as far as uniforms go, I don't like these alternative uniforms that all the teams have been doing. I think they're switching out some of them. At least the Nationals are getting a new design for their alternative uniforms.

So that I'm a nay on. I hope to see you in Florida. I'll be in Jupiter. Yeah, I'm not going to be there. I wish I could be there.

But you've heard this controversy, right? The players, outside of a couple of people, they don't like the new uniforms. They think they look cheap. Nike redesigned them, and that's been kind of the talk of spring training. Yeah, I know.

I've heard some of that buzz. Look, you kind of hear it when whenever change happens. true in politics. People don't like it. People don't like it.

We'll see. We'll see what they look like. All right, Josh Crosshauer, it's great hooking you up here on a hooking up with you on a national level, and we'll talk to you on the St. Louis show very, very soon. Thanks, Mark.

All right. Look forward to it. That's Josh Krossauer, who has been a friend and a regular on my show for many, many years, as has Michael Goodwin, who's coming up from the New York Post here in just a couple of minutes. And we'll talk about that. I do want to take a break here.

And when we come back from the break, there's an interesting controversy about the MS Society relating to pronouns, gender pronouns, etc., which I think is very revealing. I've been talking about it a little bit here. We've had some controversy with Washington University and Children's Hospital, and it's an interesting, interesting topic. We'll get to that. It's Mark Reardon filling in on the Brian Killmeat Show.

Expanding your knowledge base. It's the Brian Kill Meet Show. From his mouth to your ears, it's Brian Kilmead. All right, this is a crazy story. I've been talking about here in St.

Louis for a little bit. This is Mark Reardon for Brian. A 90-year-old volunteer at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society was asked to step away from her role as a volunteer for 60 years because she did not meet the inclusion standards.

Now, Chai Richik from Libs of TikTok has put this on the radar of a lot of people, and she talked to Fran. This is the 90-year-old woman. I was confused, I didn't know what it was, what it meant. Uh and I'd seen it on a couple of uh letters that had told Well, hang on. I screwed up the audio there.

What she's talking about there, and we're going to go back into it, is she. Fran said she didn't understand what she/her meant on an email. I was confused. I didn't know what it was, what it meant. And I'd seen it on a couple of.

letters that had come in after the person's name. They had The pronouns, but I didn't know what that meant.

So finally, when I was talking to her, I thought, I'll ask, what does it mean? You know, let her tell me. And so she said that meant that they were included, all inclusive, which didn't make sense to me. Yeah, and it didn't make sense to Fran because she didn't understand it at all. She saw she, her.

You'll hear her Chia's voice in here. You'll hear her daughter as well trying to explain the whole situation because she just doesn't get it. She thinks, wait a second, why she, her? Why not for men as well? A few days later, it was on a Friday, was at 4:58.

At 4:58, which we thought was. Odd, but anyway, at the end of the day, end of the week, I got an email from her saying that. They were sorry, but they had to ask me to step down as A volunteer for the MS Society. And the reason being is that you're not inclusive enough. The verbiage she said was that she didn't abide by their Diversity, equity, and inclusion, so they have to ask her to step down, and she can't be a part of the MS society as a As a volunteer, which to me is ironic because they're saying.

They're being inclusive, but yet they're excluding a 90-year-old Disabled woman. Yeah, it's outrageous. It really is. And so that story actually broke the video that got out probably 10 days ago. And the MS side said nothing about it.

Then on Friday, they finally issued a statement and they doubled down. They stuck to their position on the 90-year-old woman who got sent packing. It's ridiculous. This is the Brian Killmeat Show. A talk show that's real.

This is the Brian Kill Me Show. And this show this week coming to you, at least from today, from St. Louis. Mark Reardon filling in for Brian. He is on my radio show every week, and they were nice enough to invite me.

I had this President's Day off. I sacrificed my holiday because I knew Michael Goodwin was coming up from the New York Post. Michael, I told Brian, I said, The only way I'm doing this show is if I can get the regular topic. Top-level A-list guests like Josh Krausauer and Michael Goodwin, and they said you're a regular Monday guest, so it worked out perfectly. How are you?

Yeah. Well, I'm feeling a lot better right now. Thank you.

Well, I hope you had a nice weekend. Let me just ask you there in New York just a reaction to what happened with the civil trial on Friday with the $355 million judgment. And then, you know, the President, we just spoke in the previous segment, the President hawking some sneakers over the weekend. Michael, I don't know if you saw that, but all this stuff just becomes, as I told Josh, kind of white noise. And I feel like it's not even making an impression on voters because it seems to happen every day.

Well, yes, I think that's right. And also particularly this case is preposterous. Uh, I mean, it's so far on the edge that it doesn't represent anything other than the democratic desire to destroy Donald Trump in whatever way possible, or they might say by any means possible. Um, and I think this case in particular. Um is the worst of all of them.

In that, there is no crime, there is no victim, and so. by the Attorney General, Letitia James.

sort of blowing hot air into this to make it seem like the worst thing ever. And then you look at the facts, you say, well, what is she talking about? It it doesn't line up with reality. And so therefore, I think it sort of falls on its own weight. it doesn't stand the test of even a casual scrutiny.

I mean If somebody didn't know about the case and you sent to them, he was fine. $355 million and they lose his license for three years in New York and blah, blah, blah. She said, Well, gee, did he kill somebody? I mean, did he steal a building somewhere? Did he cheat on his taxes?

And in other words, It doesn't fit. with anything we know about this case. And so that's what makes it sound so ridiculous. And so they keep, it's like they keep blowing hot air onto it to try to make it seem more than it is. And it is shameful, and I think it is.

something that Other businesses in New York will take note of real estate, especially. I mean, real estate. Is is a is is a key occupation in New York. Thousands and tens of thousands of people are employed in the real estate business, whether it be brokers or selling or buying real estate, working in the buildings that are built. It's an extraordinary part of the city's economy.

And Donald Trump Was a very big part of that for a long time. Many people didn't like him. They didn't like his style, personal style. They didn't like the buildings he built. Fair enough.

But this is criminalizing all of his life, all of his business. And I think it's disgraceful for the city. I think it is. Another one of those things that make the Democratic Party look like it will do anything to destroy him. And you look, you don't have to like Trump or even plan to vote for him to think this is not right.

This goes too far. And it shames the city, it shames the state, and it should be discounted when you view the presidential election. Pay no attention to this. And I think a lot of people are not. I think that that blends in.

Now, however, let's go down to Atlanta real quick here because I think the election interference case potentially is something that people can get their arms around. Obviously, they're going to remind everyone about January 6th. I don't know if you got a chance to watch Fonnie Willis and the rest of the cast take the stand down there and thought the judge was actually very fair and was doing a good job on both sides. I'm not a lawyer. I don't know if there was enough, Michael, that was presented to disqualify Fonnie Willis.

She came out very indignant and kind of played the victim card, but there seemed to be enough to have this judge kind of scratching his head and say, maybe we do disqualify her. And then if that goes away, that's something else that. pretty clearly, I think, would play in Trump's favor. Right, no doubt about it. And also, don't forget, the first case that's going to come to trial, it looks like, is the another New York case, a Manhattan case brought by the Manhattan District Attorney.

Uh and that too has Has a lot of hair on it. I mean, through some chemical compound that only the district attorney understands. these minor bookkeeping things having to do with the Stormy Daniels payment become felonies. Under the law, they are not. And the district attorney has never explained how they became felonies instead of misdemeanor.

That's something, a piece of alchemy that everyone is waiting to see. But again, in each of these cases, you have something that calls into question the validity of the prosecution. And I think that is the key ingredient here that connects a lot of these cases. And then, of course, there are the two cases. Brought by Jack Smith, the special counsel, one involving the documents, the other January 6th.

Um We know that Joe Biden Cold. People in the White House early on that he wanted Donald Trump indicted for January 6th. We also know That Joe Biden had his own problem with classified documents, and he was not indicted.

So again, each of these cases, even if there is some validity to it, we're talking now about the presumptive nominee of the opposition party for the White House. And so and all of these prosecutors are Democrats. You cannot ignore all All of this noise and question marks around each of these cases. And as a sum total, I think that's why they have, by and large, made Donald Trump stronger politically rather than weaker.

Well, it could even swing even further in his favor if you think about the timeline here. Let's say that the judge disqualifies Fonnie Willis and the Supreme Court comes out, whatever it is, you know, whether it's not unanimous or not, eight to one, seven to two on the Colorado case. And that certainly is something that would swing things in the other direction, I think, for Trump as well. Michael Goodwin from the New York Post is here. All right, let's talk about this president right now that's in the White House and what he's doing with Israel, Michael.

You wrote a column over the weekend talking about, I think you invoked the name of Margaret Thatcher and her call to George W. Bush saying, hey, it's not time to go wobbly here. Is the president going wobbly on Israel? It seems that way. Oh, look, I think he's beyond wobbly so far.

I think he you know, Mark, when you go back and you look just at a quick time line of Joe Biden's reaction to what happened on october seventh, in the immediate aftermath, he was four square in Israel's corner. He made a famous trip there, I believe it was eleven days after the massacre, that awkward hug with Bibi Netanyahu, but providing munitions, providing sending two carrier strike force groups to the region to deter Iran primarily. Lots of things and important things about wrapping your arms around Israel in its moment of need and despair. And then you compare that with where we are now. Where every day there's a new criticism of Israel, there's a call for a ceasefire.

Biden's aides made it be known that he argues with Netanyahu in their calls. He demands this, he demands that. He calls him, he privately condemns him as an aid, dot, dot, dot, whole right to his aides. And he attacks him in other ways. There is this push for a Palestinian state.

There is a visit to Michigan to talk to Muslim American voters about the mistakes the White House made. It's not a campaign trip. This is an administrative aide goes to the Muslim Americans in Michigan and says, oh, we made lots of mistakes in supporting Israel and everything.

So it goes on and on and on. And it is clearly, he is separating himself. He that embrace with Netanyahu is now more than arm's length apart. And it is very much, I believe, that Biden is cowed by the Democrats on the left, by the Muslim Americans, primarily in the upper Midwest states. that are of course swing states, particularly Michigan.

And so I believe that he is trying to put distance. And this demand for the creation of a Palestinian state is sort of one of those wish list ideas. But now they're insisting that it be done now, that there be a mechanism set up for it to happen, even though there is no governing authority, even though most Palestinians, according to reliable polls taken from within the territories in Gaza, support what Hamas did. And so, how and the leaders of Hamas publicly say we will do it again and again and again because we will never accept. Israel's right to exist in this region.

So, how do you create this state? And what are you demanding that Israel do vis-à-vis its own security? I mean, you're setting it up for another war at best. And possibly, if that state is created, you may have a world conflagration. And that's the problem, that Biden does not confront Iran, which is behind all of this.

And so he's just kind of stumbling forward in ways that I think are dangerous not only for Israel, but for America, because we are the great Satan. Israel is just the little Satan for Iran. And this could lead to a wider war. It could lead to a global conflict. I mean, it's just I don't get it.

I mean, the desperation to try to appease the critics in his own party is, I think, leading him into a trap, a very big world trap. I agree with you on that, but you also wonder, what is that foreign policy? Let's say we get to the point. I don't think these two guys are going to debate. We get to the point where Donald Trump and Joe Biden, they're going to debate each other on foreign policy, whether it's Ukraine or Israel.

Will that be that stark of a difference? I mean, obviously, Trump's going to handle everything with a little bit different style, but I also think that there's some similarities here in not having the backbone on maybe on the reverse issues, Ukraine versus Israel, if you know what I mean. Yes.

Well, look, I think the one of the contrasts that would come up is that. Trump during his tenure helped craft the Abraham Accords.

Now, this was four Muslim nations normalizing relationships with Israel, in part with security guarantees on both sides. This is a historic event. Don't forget. Since Israel's existence In 1948, its birth, only two nations Jordan. and Egypt Had any kind of relations with Israel, and that was because they lost wars with Israel.

Here you had four Muslim nations come forward. No war involved and make this normalization agreement because they thought it was good for themselves. It was good for their trade. It was good for their security. It was good for their tourism.

And so when you find you can get kosher food in Dubai, you know something's changed. And Saudi Arabia would have been the fifth. Had Donald Trump been elected reelected, I believe it's pretty clear that Saudi Arabia would have joined or the Muslim the Abraham Accords or reached its own agreements with Israel. They've had a long time security arrangements confidentially, of course, But they've worked closely on a number of regional security issues with Israel.

So Now The the part of the plan that Biden is talking about is to create a Palestinian state, to give Saudi Arabia civil nuclear technology and to guarantee an American security umbrella. All to get it to normalize relations with Israel, which it would have done without any of those requirements before. But now that Hamas has attacked the price of Saudi normalization, it's a lot harder through the roof. Right, absolutely, absolutely. Michael Goodwin, always great to have you on, whether it's on my show in St.

Louis or here with Brian Killmead. I appreciate it. My pleasure. Thank you, Mark. We'll continue here.

This is Mark Reardon filling in for Brian. This is the Brian Kilmeat Show. giving you everything you need to know. You're with Brian Kilmead. A radio show like no other.

It's Brian Killmead. Hey, Brian's off all week. This is Mark Reardon sitting in a studio in St. Louis, filling in here this afternoon. I was watching Fox and Friends and listening earlier, and Lawrence sat down with a bunch of residents from Brooklyn.

And there was this reaction from Harlem in a town hall from people that are just angry about all of the situations that are happening with the migrants. We've seen this happen in Denver, in Boston, in Chicago. We don't have that issue really here in St. Louis, but I know in the rest of the country, this is a crisis. Colorado and Denver, obviously, maybe I said Denver already.

So, this is residents just absolutely teeing off. They're sick and tired of this in New York and Harlem. We want transparency. We demand transparency. We want the same opportunities given to these illegal citizens.

so that our future can be more productive. We're talking about a building this big city. We got enough shelters. We're oversaturated. And in every borough that doesn't have the same amount of shelters as we have, in every zip code, they have to come up and meet us first before they even start moving us.

What we're saying is that If there is some housing that is available to provide for asylum seekers, then that same housing should be first priority to those who live in this. Yeah, you would think so. That sounds dangerously close to make America great again, doesn't it?

So, I want to kind of pair that with an interview that Jonathan Carl did on ABC with Charlemagne the God, radio host, because he's talking about African Americans and the lack of support right now for Joe Biden. But he takes it in a little different direction. And he thinks, you hear Jonathan Carl's voice at first, he thinks that Biden should focus more, the campaign should focus more on January 6th, on the loss of democracy issues. I mean, Biden does make that an issue over and over again. I mean, he constantly talks about that.

Why is it not resonant?

Well, he isn't unused buyer and candidate. Like, you know, there's nothing about, you know, Joe Biden that makes you Want to listen to him. That's why he should be leaning on, you know, his vice president, Kamala Harris, who's way more charismatic than him. He should be leaning on, you know, other surrogates like Gavin Newsome.

Well, let's just kind of address the Harris issue because he's. Wait, she's more charismatic? That's what he thinks. Charlemagne thinks Harry should be out there more, you know, on the campaign trail. I mean, man, we all remember her in those Senate hearings when she was pressing those people.

I don't remember that, honestly. I don't remember that. She was like really on, you know, she was prosecuting these people. And I want to see her prosecute the case against Donald Trump in this country. I feel like she could go out there and really let the American people, you know, know what's going on.

I'd like to see her going on outlets like Fox News. I'd like to see her going in there and mixing it up. You know what? Let me just say this. I'm going to agree with Charmalene.

Charlemagne, I'd like to see her on Fox News. That would be fascinating. I don't think it would go very well for the vice president, but think about what he's calling for. I think that's rather disconnected. I think if you're looking, though, at African Americans trying to get out and vote, maybe that's what you want to do, but that's going to turn off the rest of the country.

Interesting reaction and some really fascinating conversations Lawrence had with some folks in Brooklyn. We'll try to air a little bit later. This is the Brian Killmeat show, Mark Reardon, filling in. From high atop Fox News headquarters in New York City, always seeking solutions, never sowing division. It's Brian Killmead.

Well, I am not high about the arch, but I am in St. Louis. Brian's off this week. Mark Riordan from 971 FM Talk in St. Louis.

And Mr. Kinley was nice enough, he visits with me every week, was nice enough to invite me to do this. And I was a little challenged just because I do an afternoon radio show. Here in St. Louis, I don't usually get up early in the morning.

I like to ease into the day. I have a little daughter who's about to turn nine years old and get her on the school bus and then I start moving. But this morning, I tried to go to bed a little earlier, knowing that I had an earlier wake-up time. I think I set the alarm for 5:45. 3:15 this morning, I hear this beeping sound.

In my home, and uh it's it's like at at first I thought it was that sound that the smoke detector makes when it's running out of batteries, but it was different. And um, thankfully, my wife got up. I was about to get up. Maybe she took pity on me because she knew I had to get up early. And it was the, I guess it was the battery that was going out in the smoke detector, or not the smoke detector, the ADT alarm.

So it was my alarm that was beeping, and that pretty much kept me up since 3:15 this morning, unfortunately. But we're up and moving here, and I'm glad to be here across the nation. I do have a couple of Missouri things that I'm going to self-indulge myself with and share with you the audience this morning. Senator Eric Schmidt, who. If you don't know him, you're going to get to know him here at the bottom of the hour.

He's a freshman senator from Missouri, was elected last year and is just doing a great job. And he was Senator Hawley both opposed the foreign aid bill last week.

So I primarily want to talk to him about that and some other things. But I always said this about Eric Smith. He's like one of the no offense to the rest of the people in politics who are a bunch of weirdos, many of them, except for the people on our show this morning. He's like a normal guy. We talk baseball a lot.

He's a baseball guy, and he also was arguably the MVP of the congressional baseball game last year.

So, Senator Schmidt coming up here in just a little bit. But last week, as the week was ending, I still subscribe. I feel like I pay for everything out there when it comes to streaming services and newspapers. I meet the paywall, and I subscribe to Rolling Stone magazine mainly because of the music. I will tell you that the politics has and always has driven me crazy.

Although I'm old enough to remember when PG O'Rourke wrote a conservative column for Rolling Stone. I also remember when Matt Taibbi was just a rabid lefty before he kind of switched over and started taking a look at things from a different perspective. But I see in Rolling Stone an article that is called Social Media's Cringiest Conservative is running for school board as a Democrat. And it is Bethany Mandel, who I know just a little bit, the co-author of Stolen Youth. She's been a guest of mine many times, and she is with us this morning.

Bethany Mandel, why did you let Rolling Stone Magazine do a feature on you? Are you crazy? Yeah. I mean, they were going to do it anyway, so you might as well talk to them, right? And try to get try to try to mitigate the damage as best as possible.

And if you look past the headline, it wasn't terrible considering what it could have been. They just called me a Nazi. Right. I've seen talk about how one of my issues is like anti-Semitism in the schools because I'm an Orthodox Jew. But other than that, other than calling me a Nazi, I thought it turned out okay.

Yeah, and you said that were there terms to this? The only thing that I saw is you said you will do this if you're allowed to record the conversations as well, right? Yeah. Yeah. You always record.

You don't trust anybody.

Well, you know, I don't often get um Get interviewed by print people, but I will tell you that any time over the course of my career when I've been interviewed by a print person, the quotes that end up in the paper. Or in the magazine, never the same.

Now, sometimes they make me sound smarter than I am, which I appreciate, but they never really quote you the way that you're being quoted, right? Yeah. I mean, he he quoted me correctly, but there was there he took a lot of liberties. But I think that it turned out as okay as it did because he knows I have a recording. Yeah, I think that that's a little leverage that you have.

All right, well, let's get to the crux of the matter here. Why are you, as they describe it in Rolling Stone, Bethany Mandel, deep blue Montgomery County, Maryland, running as a Democrat for your local school board? And because you homeschool, we've talked about this, you homeschool your kids.

So, what are you doing out there, you crazy Nazi?

So I have been a registered Democrat since 2021 because I like to participate in democracy. I thought the left was all about defending democracy. Here I am participating in democracy. And I'm getting roasted for it. I'm not running as a Democrat.

It's a nonpartisan race, but I am a registered Democrat, and I have been for years. Um So why am I running? This is a question I get a lot because I homeschool. And it was a question I got a lot during the open schools debate, also during COVID. Schools here were closed longer than almost anywhere else in the country.

And I'm a human and a mother who cares about children, and I see children getting hurt. And I see the damage that this county has inflicted upon our public school system. With my tax dollars, the budget is 3.3 billion with a B. And there there has to be someone sitting there saying, What you are doing is not to the benefit of children. This is like the enduring story of COVID over the last five years, especially.

Adults who are doing things. and they don't care about what is best for children.

Well, it frustrates me from a variety of perspectives. And I talk about the learning loss all the time. We are very lucky where I sit right here in the St. Louis area, where we weren't locked out as much as a lot of kids were across the country. And I guess I want your opinion on this because I'm a little frustrated that these issues, especially with the learning loss, they seemingly, Bethany, just aren't discussed very much nationally.

Now, you can make a case that that's really not a national issue. This is why I always encourage, and I think that you're a perfect example here. Local elections, these school board elections or local municipal elections are arguably more important to the way that you are affected in everyday life by government than a national election.

So it's important to pay attention.

So I don't, maybe I'd start with that question for you. Is there even a way or should there be a way to wind into the presidential conversation? And I suppose all these other congressional races, this issue of what's happened to these kids in the aftermath of COVID and how desperate it is. And, you know, the numbers are staggering. They really are.

Yeah, no, that's really terrible. I mean, this is exactly why I'm a registered Democrat because I wanted the ability to vote in my primary elections here because those are the elections that matter. And the elections that matter in our everyday lives are for the county council, are for the county executive, are for school board. I, you know, I've become a lot more involved over the course of COVID when I realize that because the people in power here where I live were destroying my home. But it's been really disappointing to see, I think, the left betray their most core values when it comes to, you remember when people used to say, check your privilege?

We don't hear that anymore. We stopped hearing that when they started using people with fewer means to be their Instacart shoppers and their DoorDash shoppers. And they closed the schools for the children of those Instacart shoppers. Um I I I've been really disappointed to watch the left really betray everything they claimed. um was most sacred to them.

You said, because some people think that this is a publicity stunt, and you reject that, don't you, Bethany? You don't need that. I don't need that. I trend on Twitter frequently enough. And I also, it's funny, I just dropped my kid off at her at a program that she's doing today.

And I'm sitting in the parking lot right now as we're talking, very rudely ignoring her teacher. And my daughter said, Should I tell her you're on the radio? And I said, No, don't tell anyone what I do. Don't tell them I wrote a book. Don't tell them.

I try to fly under the radar as much as possible because I know where I live and I like to make things easier for my children. This does not help that effort, trying to be as under the radar as possible in deep blue Montgomery County because my name will be on everybody's ballot. And when I start getting donations later this week, we'll be sending mailers to people's homes. And my cover, as best as I had it, will be blown locally. Bethany Mandela is my guest.

I love this line from Rolling.

So I think you did by insisting that you record it. Maybe you softened their tone just a little bit. They said, despite her persona as a right-wing firebrand, not Nazi in that line, Mandela is relatively buttoned up over the phone. She's very open, though, that she's having some misgivings about running for office.

So let's address that. Is it everything basically you just said, the kids and other people just being poking around in your life now when you run for this office, Bethany? Yeah, psycho. People are psycho. I, so there's a local mom blog, there's a local mom message board called DC Urban Moms.

And people, it's anonymous, so people really go at it. And I've had neighbors talking about my children, and I know they're my neighbors because they're telling stories that are close enough to true. And they talk about my children and they badmouth my children. And I know that I'm opening myself up to that 10 times more with this run. And it's not fun.

It's not a fun experience. And if I lose, I make zero money. And if I win, it's like a $25,000 a year job that's basically full-time. Like it's pretty much no win for me, but we need someone on the school board who has the best interests of the children at heart who will stop and say, What we are doing is not in the best interest of children. And that to me, that's priceless.

Like someone has to be doing that. And if not me, then who? How much of the issue in that school? By the way, when's the election? First of all, so the primary is May 14th, and then if I pass that primary stage, then it's a November election.

So, how much do you, you know, I know that you've probably written about this with book bannings and these claims that banned books are being banned? I even saw something in the Washington Post last week. You know, here's an outline of all the books that have been banned in Florida. Nothing's been banned in Florida, right? And it's frustrating to me, and I don't know how the conversation with parents go because my feeling is on these books in particular that are somewhat questionable, especially for elementary schools, it's perfectly appropriate to have age-appropriate materials.

They certainly do that with the internet. But, Bethany, I sense that a lot of the people who are following, you know, people depend on the legacy media, right? They don't see the graphic images from gender queer because the legacy media, when the New York Times writes about this or the Washington Post, they have the technology to fully put in the slides to show what people might be upset about, but they never do that. They just talk about books being banned, etc. I guess my point is I think that a lot of people, parents in school districts who just Are they trying to go about their life and deal with the crowded schedule that they have?

They buy that nonsense because they don't know the details. The details aren't really shared with them. Yeah, no, I mean, they are intentionally kept secret. And what's really disturbing about books like Genderqueer is you could joke that they're putting books into classrooms of children who can't read, but now they're turning them into graphic novels. Genderqueer is a graphic novel.

They are accounting for the fact that their hyper-focus on ideology instead of excellence. They're accounting for that. And so now they're turning all of the most graphic, disturbing content into graphic novels. And it's available to anyone. The American Library Association, as part of the things that they say, they don't discriminate on the basis of XYZ.

And one of them is age. They don't quote unquote discriminate based on age. Therefore, they believe that any book should be available to anyone of any age. Wow, wow, wow, wow. That is so disturbing, and that's not a thing that anyone talks about.

You know, and I've been bracing myself. I have a great school district here in the St. Louis area, and I love, you know, our principal, a teacher. But I listen very carefully to what my daughter says, you know, when I ask her about school, what they're learning, and I'm just bracing myself for that. You know, not that there hasn't been some indoctrination moments already attempted, but I think I'm bracing myself for more of that moment, especially how I might react.

I don't think I'll be running for school board like you, but as someone who has a big mouth on the radio, I think I have to be careful because I don't want to hurt my kids either, right? Yeah. Yeah, no, it's really hard. But at the same time, I'm sure that there it's funny. My daughter, not just my daughter, but she's the most perceptive.

My kids hear me on the radio. They hear mommy doing, you know, doing this stuff. And so they are much more attuned than 99.9% of children in America. But they miss stuff all the time. The level of subtle indoctrination is really significant.

But then the question, they put you in this position where you really have to choose between your child and your beliefs because making a stink. For example, you know, during COVID, when teachers had their pronouns on Zoom, parents are constantly faced with the question: do I stand up and say something and make things more difficult for my child, or do I just have to suck it up and swallow it? Yeah, and it's very tricky. Yeah, absolutely. Bethany Mandel, always great to have you on my show.

Thank you for joining us this morning on the Brian Kilmead show, and good luck with everything. You're realistic about this. I mean, it's still kind of an uphill battle for you to win this race, right? 100%, but it's starting a conversation in this county that desperately, desperately needs to be had. Keep it going, Bethany.

Thank you.

Appreciate it. We got Eric Schmidt, who is a senator from my great state of Missouri, coming up here in just a little bit. This is Mark Reardon filling in. This is the Brian Kilmeat Show. Coming to you on a need-to-know basis because Mandy, you need to know.

It's Brian Kilmead. The more you listen, the more you'll know. It's Brian Killmead. Brian's off this week. This is Mark Reardon.

Actually, doing the show from St. Louis, there was a real interesting column. Oh, by the way, Missouri Senator Eric Schmidt coming up. I should mention that. That's my self-indulgent interview with a Missouri guy this morning.

Peter Berkowitz is a guy that worked in the State Department for the Trump administration. He's at the Hoover Institution right now at Stanford. He wrote a column in Real Clear about a guy this morning at Harvard. And this is fascinating. It kind of piggybacks off what we were talking about with the indoctrination with younger kids.

About a guy by the name of Harry Lewis who published a Harvard Crimson column that laid the blame on Harvard for the crisis that has involved the university, engulfed the university. I'm sorry.

So he's a computer science professor. He graduated from Harvard in 1968. He served as the dean of Harvard College from 1995 to 2003. But he's also been very critical recently. And in the column that he wrote, he maintains the surge of anti-Semitism on campus following Hamas's invasion was not the fault of.

Claudine Gay, of course, resigned as Harvard's president in early January. Nor, he asserted, had the Harvard community committed or admitted anti-Semites, anti-Semitic students, anti-Semitic faculty. The problem said, and this would really come as no surprise to a lot of people, is in Harvard's curriculum. Unapologetic anti-Semitism, whether the incidents are few or numerous, is a college phenomenon because of what we teach and how our teachings are exploited by malign actors. And he did something very curious.

He just performed a simple experiment. He typed into the Harvard Online Course Catalog search box keywords associated with progressive ideology.

So he typed in decolonize. And that's in the titles of seven courses and in the descriptions of 18 more. More than triple. the appearance before 2000. The words oppression and liberation.

All this falls in line with what we've been hearing for the last couple of months. There's no doubt about that. They're each in the descriptions of more than 80 courses, while social justice is in over 100. He also searched for white supremacy and enlightenment. That's very important these days.

It's they say that the latter arises out and perpetuates the former. He discovered that the terms appearances in the online course catalog run neck and neck, both ahead of scientific revolution, but behind intersectionality, which barely registered before 2000.

So he admits, Mr. Lewis admits, that this experiment would, you know, be an imperfect measure, but nonetheless, this absolutely reflects the faculty's exploitation of the classroom to advance left-wing concepts and claims.

Now, the The interesting part of this is, and As someone who's been talking about indoctrination for a long time, I just don't have any hope that you can do anything about it. I mean, his recommendation is that the crisis at Harvard in the aftermath of October seventh Is something that needs to be addressed. You know, we need to replace the current curriculum, which advances professors' interests in niche scholarships and partisan politics, with a curriculum that serves students' interests in acquiring an organized introduction to everything that we thought we were going to college for: humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and undertaking a reasoned exploration in the United States, the West, and the world. I don't think that that's even possible in the modern era. It's a great suggestion.

We should look at it. I don't know if elite universities have it in their capability. I would predict that they do not. I'm Mark Reardon, filling in for Brian Kilmeet, Senator Eric Schmidt from Missouri coming up on the other side of the break. This is the Brian Kilmeat Show.

If you're interested in it, Brian's talking about it. You're with Brian Kilmead. Mr. Killmead is off this week. This is Mark Beard.

I'm actually doing the show from the friendly confines of my studio here in downtown St. Louis, Missouri. And I braved all the crime here, of which we have much, believe me, to come in and do the morning show filling in for Bryden. I think some other folks are going to be here the rest of the week. He's going to be gone the entire week.

But I thought this would be an opportune time for me to get on one of my good friends from Missouri politics, United States Senator Eric Schmidt, is with us this morning. How are you, Senator? Good President's Day to you. I'm doing great, Mark. How are you?

Fantastic. Great. And thank you so much for joining me. We speak on a regular basis, but I thought this would be nice to kind of catch up on some of the issues of the day. Let me start with the border.

I don't know if you watched Fox and Friends this morning. I'm going to try to play some of the audio a little bit later. Lawrence Jones went out and met with some folks who are upset with the border strategies, and Eric Adams is complaining again. Brandon Johnson in Chicago. You're seeing real.

Look, Senator, as you know, some of us have been screaming about the border for a long time and the issues related to crime, et cetera, and other things that happen throughout the country. But now you have inner-city urban Americans, African Americans that are just. Hacked off at what's happening to their resources because there's no way to handle this migrant crisis. No, that's exactly right, Mark. And so you've got, look, this thing is a total disaster, and it's It's a priority for the Biden administration, though.

There's no other way to put it. I mean, on day one, they reversed all these successful policies that we had under President Trump, whether it was, you know, remain in Mexico or Title 42, or for a long time. I mean, no matter the Republican Democrat, the policy of the United States was: if you came here illegally, you were detained and you were deported unless there was some reason, like a legitimate asylum claim, which nine out of ten of those are not, you know, are bogus, right?

So this has been flipped on its head.

So now you have 9 million people here illegally. Millions we have no idea who they are, where they're from. And where they're at. They're in a lot of these areas now that wanted to be, that proclaimed themselves sanctuary cities. But are seeing the problems.

You have kids being displaced from schools, you have community centers being overrun with illegal immigrants. It's a total mess. And it's costing taxpayers billions of dollars. And so it's look, Joe Biden could solve this mark today if he wanted to. He would just have to reinstitute the policies that we had under President Trump.

It's that simple. But the truth is, they're an open borders party now. This is what they believe. They think these borders are arbitrary, they think we're global citizens. They're also making a play for the census in twenty thirty.

You don't actually have to be a citizen to be counted for the census. And so they're doing exactly what they've wanted to do all along.

So what happens then in Congress? I mean, is it just kind of a moot point because this border effort failed? I mean, obviously, there was a bipartisan effort. You were opposed to it. Senator Lankford maybe did his best, but the House said it was DOA.

Is that it on the border right now legislatively?

Well, my contention all along is we don't need any new laws to secure the border, right? And we certainly don't want to go backwards. And that bill did a couple of things, which were terrible. One was it created an express lane For illegal immigration, in that it would have had outside of the judicial process, people called asylum agents.

So, they would have been at the border granting asylum, which is citizenship. It's a five years, you will be a citizen. We've never had anything like that before. That would certainly send a signal to cartels, make the problem worse. And it took the courts of jurisdiction like Texas that have dealt with these for a very, very long time, these issues, and moved it to guess where?

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is notoriously liberal.

So, that bill, that language would have made things worse. Are there improvements that could be made? Yes, but the fundamental issue is you have to have an executive branch interested in executing the law. And that's the fundamental problem here: Joe Biden doesn't want to have a secure border. Even if he wanted to, the energy on the left, these folks who've written white papers about open borders for decades, are now in positions of power in the White House.

They're getting exactly what they want.

So, there's a fundamental, I think, trust issue here. And this was all tied with Ukraine money. And I certainly couldn't, in good conscience. Send $61 billion to another country when we're $34 trillion in debt and our border is wide open. And I think most people are getting tired of being lectured.

Yeah, lectured about the sovereignty of other countries' borders. And the same people don't want to do anything about our own. You know, I'm rather shocked by the Chinese nationals. And I've talked about this several times in the last couple of months. Bill Malushan has been outstanding, and Fox has been amazing showing what's happening at the border.

And you have Chinese nationals, men, single men, streaming across the border. I've kind of positioned it this way, Senator. It's almost like if you would say that to our progressive friends on the left who aren't really paying attention to that, they may react in a way that would lead you to believe that they think that's conspiratorial. Oh, come on. These are just a bunch of folks from Honduras, Central America, and Mexico that are trying to make their lives better.

And I think we all have empathy for that. But the Chinese nationals issue is fascinating to me. And it certainly seems like an issue that deserves some coverage on a wider basis, but it doesn't get that, does it? No, and that's and those are the facts, Mark. If you look at the numbers, if you really dig into the numbers, we've got more young single adult men.

coming across the border than we ever have.

So these are not I mean, there are families coming across this now, but but these are single adult men, right, coming from a lot of other places other than Central and South America. They're coming from the places you mentioned, the Middle East, and China. And by the way, there's nothing compassionate There's nothing compassionate about what's happening at the border. People are drowning. It's a humanitarian crisis.

You've got Sentinel streaming across, you've got human trafficking in places like. St. Louis and New York and Kansas City, because these cartels are moving people like they move drugs and they're essentially indentured servants, right? And so, what Joe Biden has done is sent these signals to the cartels. They're completely running the show.

And if you want to understand honestly what this is all about, Mark, there was something when I was attorney general, we worked with the Trump administration on this. But they had something called Operation Talon. What was Operation Talon? Operation Talon was. An executive order, or it was an effort by the Trump administration to deport.

Previously convicted sex offenders from other countries who are here illegally.

Okay. You would think, even in this divided world we live in, we could agree on that. The Biden administration got rid of that on day one.

So that, again, just tells you this reflexive desire to undo everything that Trump did has created the problems we have now. All right, Senator Eric Schmidt from Missouri is here. Let's talk about foreign aid because you voted against. Against that. And look, it's interesting because I never really felt like I was an isolationist.

If Brian were here, I think he'd ask these questions a little differently. But I'm to the point where I'm so angry about some of these other things that are happening, including the border, and I think a lot of the American people are, that I'm not trying to be short-sighted here about Putin and his influence in Europe, but I just think that this is crazy, the amount of money that we're sending overseas, especially with a lack of accountability. You and Senator Hawley from Missouri both voted against this, but obviously a lot of Republicans voted for it.

So for you and your vote, is it a conditional vote against that because you don't like the bill overall? Do you support the aid to Ukraine and Israel under different circumstances? Right, so that's a good question to ask.

So, first of all, there's just, I don't think anybody, well, I couldn't in good conscience send that amount of money overseas when we have the open southern border. But I do think you're seeing, and some of it's generational, some of the younger members in the Senate are wanting to ask some of these tough questions. Am I isolationist? Of course not. I don't think anybody, but I think the way we've done things for so long, which is to send money in, let's say, foreign aid, to some of our enemies with no questions asked.

I think people are tired of that more $34 trillion in debt as it relates to Ukraine. Like, I would have supported Israel aid, right? We tried to pull that and separate that out, but Chuck Schmider wanted to hold that hostage, right? Because Israel had a clearly defined goal, what success looked like, and they were able to accomplish it. I think, you know, as it relates to Ukraine, we're $112 billion in now, another, you know, $61 billion in this package that they're trying to pass.

We've already been told in briefings, they're going to ask for another $100 billion. And I think it's incumbent upon us as people who represent taxpayers, to what end? What does winning look like? What does peace look like? What kind of political coalition?

What are the Europeans doing to step up? Again, I think asking more of these NATO allies that, quite frankly, have relied on the generosity of the United States of America for a very long time in the security blanket, I think it's time for them to step up. And so I think we're entering a new phase where more people are asking questions. They're just not simply going to accept. You need to do this because we ought to be very critically about this and make sure.

So, anyway, I think there's a movement afoot. to do more of those tough you know kind of tough questions I thought this was amazing. Senator Romney said that he felt like this was the most important vote of his life. He said, if you don't vote to send aid to Ukraine, Russian President Putin is going to invade a NATO nation. Then obviously he wound China into this, saying that the U.S.

will not live up to its promises to help Taiwan. I'm with you. I think legitimate questions need to be asked. I think the American people at this point are demanding this, especially when they see the compare and contrast. Not to argue that these are not significant issues geopolitically around the planet, but we tend to have our own issues here in the U.S., especially at the border, and that's spreading throughout the country.

So that issue in and of itself, I think, is drawing an interesting compare and contrast for voters and independent voters, Senator, moving into a presidential election year. That's right. And also, we need to expand our capacity, Mark. A lot of the things they're talking about, the money that's being spent for Ukraine, like Europe has completely, you know, sort of, because of this green movement and these climate activists, have pulled away from being energy independent. And who do they rely on for energy?

Russia. America should be energy dominant and exporting to our friends and allies. But you've got the same thing happening now.

So the Biden administration is cutting that off. LNG, we ought to be doing that to help our friends and allies around the world. We ought to be expanding production. The Chinese, the Communist Party and Chinese, they're producing, they have 12 naval shipyards, we have four. Each one has greater capacity than all of ours combined.

We need to be laser-like focused on China. They are a real threat. If you care about American national security, we ought to be focused on two things.

Now, there aren't, it's not to say there aren't other things, but two big things. One is our own security at the southern border and winning the 21st century against communist China. They're coming, they're in space, they've militarized islands in the South China Sea, and all this debate about what's happening in Europe takes us away from what our big real threat is long term, which is China. Senator Schmidt, I don't think I've spoken with you after her report, the special counsel report, and that really sent off a flurry of more questions.

Some of us were asking questions in an uncomfortable way. I don't like to make fun of everyone, anyone who's older and doesn't have a cognitive ability that seems to be up to par. But that report in and of itself, and the White House did not react very well, was something that led to columns in the New York Times. Axel Rod and some of the others have been vocal about the president's age, but there's a lot of pressure here now to say, as recline, I think, over the weekend, hey, it's time, Jon Stewart, it's time to step out. But having said that, There really doesn't appear to be, Eric, a legitimate way for the president to step aside.

So this is what we have. But behind the scenes, And where you are this has to be even discussed more. Yes.

And look, it's not I don't I don't take any joy in it. There's nothing I'm not gleeful about it, but the truth is the President is of diminished capacity. I mean, read the report. I mean, he was not they viewed him not competent to stand trial, to be on the witness stand. He could not remember when he was Vice President of the United States.

I mean, these are, we talk about foreign policy issues, we talk about the national border. You certainly have to have a president who is competent and can make decisions. And this report obviously draws big questions there. And so I think, you know, it showed a couple of things. One is that two standards for justice, one for Joe Biden and one for Donald Trump.

I think that is adding jet fuel to President Trump's campaign because people see it intuitively. Americans see it, not just Republicans. They see it. And we don't want to go down that road and be a banana republic. And they see that every day.

But also, the competency issue with Joe Biden. I mean, it's, you know, hardly a day goes by. Where you know. Has problems getting through a sentence. And so I think it's going to be a big issue in this campaign.

Look, I had, I was looking for this soundbite. I can't find it off the top of my head here. But there was, I think it was Whoopi on the most politically defining talk show in America, The View, last week, saying something in defense of the president of his age. And there's no reason to address this issue right now because nothing, I'm paraphrasing here just a little bit, but that nothing has happened yet. And my reaction was: wait a second, and we're pretty good in this country doing that.

Should we wait for something even more damaging? Let's admit that at this point, there have been relatively minor gaps. I think they've set up some alarm bells with our international partners, but there hasn't been anything major. That's not to say there couldn't be, Senator. And I think that that's what people might be bracing for, and it could be more damaging than we would hope.

So that's the concern that people have. It's realistic, but nobody in the White House wants to listen to that right now, do they? No, they don't. They don't. I mean, they've got power, right?

And they're not going to willingly sort of give that up, even if the face guy, the President of the United States, Can't remember important facts like when he was vice president.

So I think we're out where we're at. But I do think what this race will ultimately come down to is people compare and contrast when in the four years when President Trump was president, we were energy dominant. We had a secure border. People were making more money. We didn't have the record inflation that we have now.

All of those things. We don't have any of those things. We had them then. We don't have them now. And I think people are also going to weigh who is the person.

You see, President Trump's got all this energy. He's hopping around from place to place. He's huge rally. They're going to have to keep Joe Biden. Wow.

Yeah. Eric, I said this to our mutual friend Jane Duker last week. I mean, can you even imagine having these debates take place? I can't see that they will because there's such a stark difference. One final question here: for people who don't know you nationally, arguably the MVP of the congressional baseball game last summer with a big triple that almost went out of the park.

Are you in training for this year's game already? I am. I'm shedding some pounds and working out, getting ready for our practices, which start bright and early at 5:45 in the morning. That's East Coast time, not Midwest time.

So we're ready. We took the Democrats down 16 to 6, and we're going to do it again.

So I'm excited.

Well, you were huffing and puffing a little bit once you got the third. I did notice that. Taking care of the fitness might be recommended. Thank you, Eric Schmidt. I always appreciate it.

Thank you very much. He's a rising star here in Missouri and across the country as well. This is Mark Reardon filling in for Brian Kilmead. He's off this week. This is the Brian Kilmeat Show.

Newsmakers and newsbreakers. Here at first on the Brian Kilmeat Show. Radio that makes you think. This is the Brian Kill Me Show. Hey, Brian's off all week.

This is Mark Reardon doing the show from St. Louis, Missouri. You know, Eric Adams did a U-turn last week. They wanted to convert this abandoned luxury apartment into a complex for illegal migrants. You've seen the outcries.

We've talked about this a little bit, even in this hour across the country in Boston, in Chicago, in Colorado. There was a hearing last week in Lakeland, or Lakewood, I think it was, where residents were like, wait a second, you're doing what? We pay taxes. And these were white folks in Colorado, but you have had, you know, black citizens all across major cities that are really getting more vocal on this.

Now, one of the questions I always have here is: who's covering this? Fox is doing a great job covering it. Brian talks about it all the time. I talk about it on my talk show. I don't know if CNN, New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times, Rolling Stone, do they cover this part of the story?

Now, Lawrence Jones this morning was covering this and had a great town hall with some folks just sitting down, finding out what they were upset about with Eric Adams and some of the things that they were trying to do with the migrants. Yeah. Piece by piece, bit by bit, and this is probably accelerating right now. People are sitting in these urban areas in particular saying, wait a second, these are our resources that are going to the migrants. They're not here legally in this country.

Maybe they would say we want to help. We want to make sure that they're okay. But what about us? This is Tiffany Fulton, who is upset. Cut number three.

It's the city, DSS, and DHS. You know, they're doing this. They snuck them in here in Harlem with no transparency. You know, we're coming out and we see bunk beds being moved in. What's going on?

And nobody was aware that this was happening. No one. I reached out to every elected official. in the 70th Assembly of District and no one knew anything. Yeah, and that story was repeated over and over again.

Lawrence sat down with all these people and they said there's no transparency for the people of color in New York that are rent-burdened, in particular, and in central Harlem alone, 44% of the people are rent-burdened, which means that a third of their income goes to rent. And in their community, they see neighbors being displaced. That is unbelievable. There's a ton of pushback. It's starting to ramp up.

Great job, by the way, by Lawrence Jones doing that segment this morning on Fox and Friends. This is Mark Reardon filling in for Brian, and this is the Brian Kilmead Show. From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest-growing radio talk show. Brian In Kill Mead. Yeah, Brian is off all week, so we're not in Midtown Manhattan this morning.

I'm in St. Louis, Missouri, downtown on what is a beautiful, beautiful morning. Interestingly enough, about St. Louis, it was supposed to, this is perfect. I think those of you around the country can certainly relate with this.

There was supposed to be a dusting of snow in St. Louis on Friday. And then about mid-morning, they adjusted the forecast to say, ah, we might get one or two inches. Before it was all over, it was like four to five. School buses couldn't get the kids home.

The area was paralyzed. Cars off in ditches.

So, and these are the people that are predicting, you know, climate change. Let's not forget. They can't get it right 12 hours later. But it is a a beautiful day. Today.

I'm actually surprised that Brian's off all week because I've known him to be a workaholic. I think he's going to go with. Through withdrawal, not being able to work. We have the Daytona 500 coming up a little bit later today. They canceled it because of weather yesterday.

I want to mention that because, and I'd already had him set up as a guest, one of my favorite people really on the planet, Kenny Wallace, who's local here in the St. Louis area. He's from Arnold, Missouri, NAFCAR legend, and really one of the funniest people you ever meet. And he'll have a good take, not only on the race, the Daytona 500, but on the show Full Speed, which is on Netflix right now. Great documentary.

Riley Gaines is coming up a little bit later this hour as well. You had another one of these stories. It's just stunning. It seems to happen every week, almost as month as Joe Biden has a gaffe. Maybe every other day, a male swimmer has broken some women's records at a Division III school.

And we're going to talk about that and how Title IX just apparently means nothing. But right now, Fox News contributor, former House Oversight Committee Chairman, the author of The Puppeteers: The People Who Control, the People Who Control America. Jason Chaffett's with us. Jason, how are you this morning? Hey, thanks for having me.

I appreciate it. Do you? Have a pair of the golden Trump sneakers on by any chance when you've been wearing those on the set this morning. I'd be on eBay trying to hawk those things, making a little bit of profit. Those things are as hot as gold.

Yeah, I. And styling too, that just fits my look. I just can't wait because it's going to happen. I don't know if it's going to happen at a station event, but I'm going to see somebody wearing these out in public soon enough, you know. Rocking the Trump shoes or sneakers, which I think would be funny.

Pete Hegseth from Fox News is probably the leading candidate. I think I'd see him wearing those. Absolutely. I'd put a little money on him for sure. All right, let's talk about the weekend.

Another weekend, another Biden gaffe coming off the long pause on Friday with even, I think, more people. I saw a column, Jason, by Ezra Klein. The voices have really grown in the last 10 to 12 days after her report to Joe Biden, the messaging, hey, you should get out because it's time. But that is not resonating, and it probably doesn't make any difference, even though those voices are sort of climbing right now, Jason. Does it?

Well, I I still maintain that Joe Biden will not be the nominee. You do yeah, yeah, I've I've said this for like more than a year. I thought he'd get out by the end of the calendar year, but um at this point, I think the Democrats are in a conundrum because they've got Kamala Harris in the number two slot and she's even worse. But I think every it's so apparent to everybody that he is just cognitively not up to the job. It's not so much about his age as his cognitive nimbleness and his ability to think and walk at the same time.

That it's it's resonated so many. I mean, yeah, Charlemagne, the God, right, talking and being critical about how uninspiring he is. He's a gaffe machine every time he stands up, even when he tried to make the case that he was mentally right there with it. He makes a major gaffe about the President of Mexico when he was actually talking about the President of Egypt. I mean, these these are world leaders he's talking about.

I I was in that camp, I'll be honest with you, I was in that camp that thought to myself, just because My brain tells me how in the world can this guy be the nominee? But the more this lingers on, the more it drags on, and I just see no path for him to get out, unless he finally comes to his senses and makes a speech and says, Look, I think it's best for the country to move forward. I mentioned Ezra Klein. I think we have a little audio of what he said over the weekend: Cut 13. To say this is a media invention.

That people are worried about Biden's age because the media keeps telling them to be worried about Biden's age. If you've really convinced yourself of that in your heart of hearts, I almost don't know what to tell you. In poll after poll, 70 to 80 percent of voters are worried about his age. This is not a thing people need the media to see. I think Biden, as painful as this is, should find his way to stepping down as a hero.

And then I think Democrats should meet in August at the convention. to do what political parties have done at conventions so many times before. Organize victory.

Okay, now that's the sentiment, Jason Chase.

So then what do you do with Harris? That's the question. It always has been the question. What do you do there? Yeah, and this is where Democrats, again, put themselves in a box saying that they need to pick a person based on the color of their skin and maybe their gender as opposed to let's pick the very best person for the job.

And that plays itself out. I don't know how they get around the Kamala Harris problem that they've created for themselves. She was a horrific pick. Yeah, she was like in eighth place or something back when she dropped out in her own state of California. Andrew Yang was pulling ahead of her in her own state, the state of California from which she was a senator.

And she's just, you know, she's accomplished nothing. She's horrific coming to the microphone and trying to articulate something. Usually, she will oftentimes use the same word three times in one sentence. And so, what are they going to do? How do they get around the conversation?

Kamala Harris problem that they've created. I don't know. And they have a weak bench.

So I think they're in a real bad spot.

Well, as a talk show host, I'm looking forward and fascinated by seeing what's going to happen here because I think it's going to be interesting. Let's talk about the RNC just a little bit. Trump's out there campaigning for even Lara Trump to be the head of the RNC. This is Chris Sununu, the governor of New Hampshire, talking about Nikki Haley addressed this a little bit over the weekend, too, but he's talking about the issue with money because in order it's not just the White House, obviously. You have congressional races, we have a Senate race here in Missouri, where I sit right now.

This is cut number 19. The fact that she's raising money and spending money on a campaign, he's spending all of his money right now, at least $50 to $60 million, on his legal fees.

So, where are the resources going to come from? The RNC itself has a record low amount of cash on hand because of his leadership and his type of message. You need everybody to get in here. If you don't get those suburban moms back, you don't get some of those young voters back, you cannot win in November. And that's what this is about.

Yeah, and Jason, along those lines, you got Mike Johnson, who seemingly is settling in okay as Speaker of the House, but he's never gone out like. Kevin McCarthy and raised a bunch of money, which is part of his role as a speaker, at least outside the chamber, isn't it? Yeah, I think Speaker Johnson will do just fine. I think everybody will want to meet him, hear from him, see him. The idea that he's new actually plays in a newers to his benefit.

For the RNC, I wrote an op-ed for Foxnews.com a few weeks ago, and I said, look, Democrats are ahead. You know, it's not good enough to just be ahead on the issues and think that you're going to win based on inflation and the economy and all the overseas problems in immigration and Joe Biden's cognitive decline. That's not enough. You have to have a ground game. You've got to be able to get out the vote.

Democrats are far superior in this. They use unions and not-for-profits, and they've been playing this game 365 days of the year for years. They just don't give up on it. And they changed a bunch of rules across the nation over the last several years about how we vote. Republicans have kind of complained about it, but they didn't galvanize towards it.

Ballot harvesting is still like a new word. For Republicans, Democrats live by this. And so I think the Democrats are far ahead in many of these races because of how well organized they are to actually get out the vote.

Well, I agree with you.

So then I don't know what Ronna's responsibility there or how well she did at it, but that's seemingly something that the RNC chair, whoever that would be, is going to have to organize and focus on. And I would say time is running out. It should probably have been happening years ago. You're right. The amount of money by the tens of millions that's going out the door in terms of fighting legal fees, again, Democrat strategy worked pretty well, actually, to try to drain the bank of the Republicans to try to play in defense in court.

And to that extent, it's not helpful. And again, What's happening in your own community? What's happening? You just don't see the same type of Republican response as you see with the Democrats. And for Republicans, that's the problem.

Jason Chaffettz, great to have you on as we start this week on this President's Day. I appreciate it. Oh, thank you. All right, take care. Brian is off all week.

This is Mark Reardon filling in on this Monday. I'm not going to be here the rest of the week, but I do have a couple more things coming up this hour that I'm very excited about. My friend Kenny Wallace, NASCAR legend, and the Daytona 500 is going to take place this afternoon. Rain got in the way. They had to cancel it or postpone it, I guess, as the case may be.

It'll air on Fox this afternoon. Also, Riley Gaines coming up. There was another story, even this weekend, of a swimmer, Division III, biological male swimmer, that won, blew away the women in competition. We're going to talk about that and a couple other things that have popped up related to the trans issue on the Brian Killmeat show on this Monday morning. Want even more Brian?

Download the podcast at BrianKillMeadShow.com every episode. Exclusive interviews on demand. More of Kill Me coming up. Breaking news, unique opinions. Hear it all on the Brian Kill Me Show.

And this week, Brian's off. This is Mark Reardon doing the show on this President's Day from St. Louis, Missouri. And a little bit of a Missouri connection here. The Daytona 500 was postponed.

NASCAR had to scrap the race yesterday for the opening of the NASCAR season, and they delayed it to this afternoon. You will watch it on Fox. My good friend from right here in the St. Louis area, NASCAR legend, the one, the only, the Herminator, Kenny Wallace, with us this morning to preview the race and explain what happened yesterday. Kenny, how are you?

Yeah. Mark, I'm doing great. From Arnold, Missouri, about twenty miles outside of St. Louis is where I live. And I'm doing really good.

I'm like everybody all over the world right now. The Daytone of five hundred is NASCAR's biggest race. And we all have been patiently waiting.

However, When you watch the weather channel, it's beautiful all over America. But this two days of solid rain has just Uh got You know the state of Florida just drenched in rain. My friends, and I see all the videos, it finally quit raining there about 30 minutes ago.

So 48 hours of rain. It's been incredible.

So they obviously can't run the race. They're going to run it this afternoon. Is there still a threat of rain this afternoon to pick back up, or do you think they're going to get it in? I think they're going to get in. They're looking good.

The great thing about NASCAR is they know that rain is so annoying. What they do is they've done everything in their power. They have big lights So they can run at night. And also, they have these new design jet dryers that have been out for about. You know, 10 years now, that's relatively new.

They know how important it is to get the racetrack drive, so I feel good about it. As you said, it's going to start at four o'clock Eastern Standard Time. And I tell all my friends that are chief It's on rabbit ears. It's on Fox T V local.

So, right. I don't want to hear about any complaining about having to pay for it. No complaints at all. Hey, but what is there this is another point of confusion for me. Is there also another race after the Daytona tonight at that track?

And that is breaking news, and that's why you are so good. That just came out. one hour ago because we woke up this morning and it was raining, we got to go back two days ago, okay? On Saturday, we were supposed to run the second biggest division, which is called the NASCAR Infinity Series.

Well, it rained all Saturday, too.

So they said, well, we'll run that race Sunday morning before the Daytona 500.

Well, it just kept raining and raining and raining. And so now, tonight, after the date, tone of 500, one hour after the date, tone of 500, on this Monday night.

Now, this one's going to upset people. You're going to have to go over to FS1, but that's still good. and you'll be able to watch the Infinity race, and that's a really good one, and that one is three hundred miles long.

So, because I don't know, you know, I don't know racing as much. You got Joy Logano is in the pole position. Who's going to win this Daytona 500? And can you really do it if you're that far back in the pole position in the pack? This Race, choosing a winner in NASCAR is like going to a casino at the roulette table.

Yeah. You know, so I'm going to choose Tyler Reddick. He is in what we call the nasty beast car. This is a new hard lemonade. That Monster Energy just came out with.

Uh listen, he won on Thursday night. They've already been racing some qualifying races. We know Joey Logano and Michael McDowell are on the front row for the Daytona five hundred. But starting second row in sight, starting in the third position, is Tyler Reddick. He won the race.

He looked good. Got a great sponsor. I'm going to go with Tyler Reddick to win the race.

So, when we spoke, Kenny and I talk all the time. We spoke a few weeks ago about the Netflix series Full Speed, and they just announced a second season for Full Swing, which is the one that focuses on PJ golfers. I thought it was fascinating. Have you, at that point, then we had a conversation a couple weeks ago, you had not yet watched Full Speed. Have you checked it out at this point, or are you remiss in your homework, Kenny Wallace?

I'm missing my homework because I myself went to Kabul for seven days and then I went directly. to Daytona. You know, I just got done racing. I still race my dirt car. I'm sixty years old, but we won.

I'm in great shape. I just got back from Florida. And man, I've been on the go, but I'm going to get around to it. But I do know this. the new Netflix series about NASCAR.

has done its job. It's got everybody buzzing.

Now everybody likes the drivers more. They know what kind of homes they live in. They know more about their children. And this is key to making everybody you know, like people because now they feel invested. They know more about The race car drivers.

So I see NASCAR trending upwards in a big way right now. Yeah, and that's, I think, part of the goal. Look, as someone who more casually follows this, it was really cool to get to know Denny Hamlin and some of these other drivers and what they're all about. And, you know, I think we have Major League Baseball is a good example of where they need to do a better job of this. The NFL has hard knocks and a couple of shows.

They give you some insight into players. But Kenny, as you know, we have a great example here in St. Louis with Adam Wainwright, who retired from the Cardinals and is now going into the broadcast booth. But Wayno's always been someone that has been accessible to the media, and he's just real. He keeps it real.

You're a guy that keeps it real. If the fans have a chance to meet some of these people, because you know, I've always joked that there must be some sort of playbook for athletes where they go into this tutorial of how they're supposed to answer questions. Coaches, too. We gave it our 110%. And I get that it's tough after a loss or maybe even after a victory in the heat of the moment to comment to the media, but some insight outside of the game itself into the personalities of the athletes, I think it's awesome.

for the fans. We are in the new world, Mark Reardon, where social media is the real deal. It's here, it's like the newspaper, it's like radio. And some of the sports psychologists Are telling some of our great athletes. do not engage on social media.

However, here's the issue. All the athletes are all over social media.

So they see it, right?

So they're strolling, they're scrolling through social media. But they don't engage. The strong-minded ones, the ones that are very strong and winners, they are able to do both. They do not let anybody bring them down because they understand it's you know, it's it's the old child's rhyme. Sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me.

So the great athletes are able to be on social media, and what that does is that helps your fan base.

Okay, that grows the sport. You don't engage with defoul people that are just there to be mean because they had a rough childhood.

So yes, and you know, Adam Wainwright right here in St. Louis or You know, any of your great athletes They're able to jump on social media every once in a while, say, hello, how are you doing? We had a great game last night. or it was a tough one, and move on. But yeah, so right now, this Netflix being engaged with these athletes is.

Yeah, help them see. Check it out. I think you would admit that both you and I have had some issues over the years in not trying to respond or being able to not respond when you shouldn't respond. I'm working on that still at my age. Kenny, enjoy the Daytona 500.

Thank you so much for being with me this morning on Kill Meet Show. Appreciate it. Great job. Thank you.

Bye-bye. This is the Brian Killmeat Show. The fastest three hours in radio. You're with Brian Kilmead. Brian is off all week.

This is Mark Reardon. I'm actually doing the show this morning from St. Louis. And our next guest, Riley Gaines, the author of Happy No Snakes Day, I believe was in my state. Might have even been in St.

Louis recently. Riley, were you in St. Louis? How are you? Happy President Stay.

Hope all is well.

Well, thank you so much for having me, Mark. And yes, I was. Um, I did a library reading down in Branson, Missouri. Uh, and I did. I went up to St.

Louis and I had a press conference with the Attorney General, um, A.G. Bailey, who has. He's really been a leader on the forefront of a lot of this gender ideology movement and pursuing litigation and really defending the rights of parents and of women and the safeguarding of children.

So, could not have been more glad to stand alongside him.

Well, Andrew is great. And as you know, I kind of talk about sometimes I talk about St. Louis in two ways as ground zero. One, with the Mike Brown shooting from nearly 10 years ago, but on this issue in particular, and look, I've been talking about the trans issue for several years now, and believe me, I appreciate your voice. But we had, you know, Washington University, prestigious elite university and children's hospital here in St.

Louis, Jamie Reid, the whistleblower, came out. It was about this year at this time, or last year at this time, that her report came out.

Now, interestingly enough, Riley, and you've seen this, there has been slowly but surely a little bit more of that narrative from people even in this field that have been more vocal in the New York Times and the LA Times. It's slow, and of course they get all the backlash that you do, but a little bit more bravery in the last year, I think, and maybe because of Jamie.

Well you You're certainly right. It was pretty cool because when I was in St. Louis, they had three school board whistleblowers who were there who blew the whistle on really the insanity of what's going on in the education system and the people, the higher-ups, even above them, and what they're pushing for. Again, pushing on the most vulnerable, right, the children.

So you're totally right. I think the tide, slowly but surely, it's certainly turning. Parents are waking up. I think medical professionals are waking up. I mean, just people in general.

They see the insanity of what's going on. And now, unfortunately, we're seeing the repercussions and the consequences of what's going on. And I think people who, you know, maybe would have considered themselves apolitical, didn't really want to get involved before, they're involving themselves now. And did this happen again over the weekend or last week at Ramapo College?

Now this is a Division Three school, but what happened with the biological male that blew away the women, right? Oh, Mark, did it happen again? It's happening, it seems, every day now. But you're exactly right. You said what happened.

Look, it's the same story every single time. A mediocre man on the men's team decides to switch over to the women's team to become a record smasher. And what happened at Ramapo College is certainly no different. Again, a male switches to the women's team. He broke multiple school records at their NJIC conference championships.

And again, this is college, right?

So he's taken a scholarship. He has taken a roster spot. He has taken a spot on the championship team. There's only a limited number of spots. He took a spot from a deserving, hardworking girl.

And it breaks my heart because. Having the platform that I have, I receive messages from his teammates or from other girls who have competed against him, and they feel so. Lost. They don't know what to do. Several of them reached out to me and told me, Look, we feel as if we will be reprimanded if we speak out about this.

We don't know what to do, but we know this is wrong. And look, I understand that because I was there. Um the threats and the risk. They're real, and it's a really terrible position to put these 18, 19, 20-year-old girls in.

So, what is your advice there? I have a couple of questions about the bravery issue. One of them is about the media, but on the athletes themselves, because even in the situation with the swimmer from Ramapo, you had the teammates, the girls that were with this particular swimmer, holding arms together, hugging, smiling. But you know, behind the scenes, some of them don't feel this way.

So, what is your advice if you hear from a parent or an athlete? They don't want to get canceled, they don't want to become the focus of backlash. I get that as someone who's a somewhat public figure. What do they do? I know.

It's a difficult position to be in. And look, I will happily admit that I changed my mind on this. At first, I didn't think. it should be up to the girls to sacrifice anything, right? We're the ones who worked hard to get there.

There are people who are in place who are supposed to be protecting us. It's their job to stand up for us. But the minute I changed my mind, it was actually when the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act was introduced in the U. S. House, And it fell entirely on party lines, meaning two hundred nineteen Republicans voted in favor of protecting women and girls in sports and all two hundred and three Democrats.

Every single last one of them. All 203 Democrats voted in opposition to protecting women and girls in sports. And that's when I realized. You know, up until this point, I thought legislation and policy, that's how we fix this. And ultimately, it is.

I realized in that moment, gosh, what a naïve thought to wait for people to do the right thing unprovoked. We have to take action into our own hands as everyday people, as consumers, as female athletes ourselves. And so, what we can do and what needs to be done, and again, I know it's easier said than done, but don't go when the gun blows. Um, let the boy race on his own. I think that's the most powerful and the most effective way to send the message.

That we're look, enough is enough, we're saying no. You know, and I had Greg Stuby on my show in St. Louis last week talking about the Save Women's Sports Act. And the thing that's frustrating, I think even more frustrating about that vote from where I sit in the middle of the country is, and Congressman Stuby said that, look, this is not even close. It's an 80-20 issue, right?

It's not like 52 to 48 or something like that. I have, I have to say nice things about my friends here at Riley, who are Democrats, because the common sense Democrats who I know in this part of the country, they're just as outraged as you and I are on this.

Now, one of the questions that I have, and I'm really curious about your answer, I highlight this all the time. Why, maybe this is rhetorical, Riley, but the legacy sports media, the ESPNs of the world, our local newspaper, the athletic, whatever sports publication you want to, this story about this male swimmer or any of the stories in cycling, et cetera, those are legitimate sports stories. No matter what your opinion should be, that should be something that should be featured in sports journalism. But it's not, it's just silenced constantly. They won't touch it.

um which is incredibly frustrating. Um, yes, for for everyone, right? It's their job to report on stories. We're not asking them to give their opinion on it. Just report on it, and they won't do it.

Um I think a lot of that, uh, of course, Well, ESPN in particular is owned by Disney.

So that should tell you everything you need to know right there. But what this movement is driven by, whether that's the medicalization side, whether that's the social side, whether that's what's happening in sports or in corporate America, I mean, every realm, this movement is driven by money, or I guess the fear of losing money. And so look, ESPN, right, they don't follow red or blue. They follow green. They follow where the money is taking them.

And they will realize very quickly that this hurts them. Because like you said, this is a winning issue. And look at Bud Light, for example, the most well-known example, lost $27 billion. And their next commercial was a big burly man on a motorcycle with a camo can.

So it shows you they're following the money. ESPN. And again, in particular, they had a during Women's History Month. Last March. They had a special highlighting Leah Thomas as this brave and inspiring and stunning woman who has overcome so much adversity and persecution to achieve the seemingly impossible.

Um, which I thought was incredibly distasteful. Phone deaf to their audience. Um and they paid for it. All those things. And I highlighted that when it happened.

Look, I have a nine, she's about to turn nine in a couple of weeks, and she's a swimmer. She just started in. A nice swim club here in St. Louis. And when people hit me on Twitter or other social media, Riley, on this issue, they say, Why do you care so much?

I say, Because I have a little girl who's an athlete now and she doesn't have a penis, and I think it's important. And I don't understand why this isn't discussed more publicly in broader ways. But thankfully, you're there and I think you're a hero. And I consider myself a Riley Gaines Super fan. And for some reason, this is terrible on the part of the host, I was unaware of the book Happy No Snakes Day.

And I know it came out a few weeks ago, so tell me more about Happy No Snakes Day. And my apologies that I was unaware.

Well, it is aimed for children. And unless you identify as a twelve year old, then I don't blame you. But you're exactly right. I partnered with Brave Books, who has been Phenomenal. It's important that we have these alternatives, right?

Alternatives, again, and anything you could imagine, whether that's makeup, whether that's skincare, whether that's your phone provider, clothing outlets. Of course, Brave Books is an alternative to Scholastic, which, as you and I know, Scholastic is the group, the organization that's putting these age-inappropriate books in children's schools.

So I partnered with Brave Books. We wrote the book, Happy No Snakes Day, which is about telling the truth despite being afraid, despite what the consequences might be. And so that was a lot of fun. It's you know, I think the attack on our children, as we've said multiple times, it has It's prevalent and it is only increasing. And so that's who we need to reach with this message.

And look, the book isn't political, of course not. It's not partisan. Brave Books, they do a great job of teaching pro God, pro America, pro family values. Um, so could not be more excited to to have partnered with them. I am most certain that this book is already in the majorities of elementary school libraries and schools across the country, Riley Gaines, right?

You had to be overwhelmed with just library orders for the book. Definitely. And that certainly continues.

Well, what I mean, you're trying, you know, the point about that would be there are books along those lines that deal with issues of gender and of race that are in school libraries, and they're watered down so allegedly they're appropriate for kids. I would argue, and I think you would too, that some of these should not be in schools, which is what some of the fight has been about. But there would really realistically be, outside of the God stuff, I guess they'd flag that, no reason to keep a book like this out of a school library, but you won't even get a sniff. No, no. Which, again, you can't be overly surprised by it, but I have been.

just incredibly grateful for the support that I've had from From parents of young kids, right, or grandparents. I think now more than ever, these people are desperate to hear. the truth and to be taught the these actual good virtues, right? Because the other side, they throw around words like compassion and empathy and inclusion, which in theory are all phen they're they're wonderful things. But when they say inclusion, they really mean exclusion.

And make no mistake, it's not compassionate to ask a young girl to undress in front of a man. That's not what compassion is.

So it's time we take back these virtues and, I guess, reclaim their original definition of what these words mean.

Now, I know you mentioned you were here in St. Louis or i you know, in in Branson as well, but are you still on an active tour of spreading the word about this? And then seemingly every time you go somewhere, and hopefully it didn't happen too badly here in my state, but you you have these organized groups that go against you, chase you into the back of a room, et cetera, right? Always. And it certainly did happen in Missouri, which shows you there's pockets of this everywhere.

But yeah, a big push of mine and what I've dedicated a lot of my time to in these next coming months is speaking on college campuses. As we said, the youth is so important, and that stands true for my generation, Gen Z. Being a recent college graduate myself, I know how hostile and unwelcoming these environments are to people with, I mean, Christian conservatives, really.

So that has been a big push of mine. I will be speaking at UNC tomorrow and then South Carolina and then Clemson. I spoke at Hannibal LaGrange actually in Missouri.

So just trying to engage the youth. It is so important because it is our future. It's up to us to put this country back on the right track. Have you ever had an exchange with someone who is on the other side and just asked the issue? Maybe it's a parent, just ask the issue of fairness and how they think it's fair that a daughter like mine, for example, or, you know, even swimmers that are at the NCAA collegiate level should have to compete against biological men and just put them on the spot and say, really, you think that's fair?

Is the answer always, well, they're a girl now, right? They're a woman. They've transitioned. Yes.

The answer that I get a lot is that, well, it's about more than just winning. What about this person's happiness? What about their feelings? They could kill themselves if you don't affirm this. And they make it this really what I would call emotional blackmail.

And it's effective, right? Because, of course. I don't want to be responsible for anyone's death. I don't want to have blood on my hands, like they constantly say. But that's the tactics they use.

They try to blow this out of proportion. They try to make you feel guilty. They try to gaslight, really, young girls. And that's what they've done, and that's how it's been effective. It works, believe it or not.

When you tell a young girl, and this happens time and time again, especially among academic institutions, when you tell a young girl, she will be guilty of murder if she advocates for fair play and privacy in areas of undressing. But I've reached a point now where, of course, I don't want those things. Of course not. But Um we cannot back down from the truth. at the expenditure of our rights as women and our opportunities and our fairness and our safety and our dignity, quite honestly.

Absolutely. I'm praying for you. I'm rooting for you. I know my daughter is as well, even though she doesn't have the mindset to understand all of this.

Someday she will, Riley Gaines. Thank you so much. Keep up the fight, and hopefully, we'll talk again. Absolutely. Thank you, Mark.

Take care. You know, she mentioned the suicide thing. The thing about that, the dirty little secret about the suicide situation with trans kids, the suicide rate amongst people who have transitioned is astronomically high. It's not the kids who are confused and have a mental illness that are killing themselves. That's just a bunch of BS, but they repeat it time and time again.

It's Mark Reardon in for Brian Killmead. This is the Brian Killmead Show. Honest commentary, unique opinions, no agenda. It's Brian Kilmead. The talk show that's getting you talking.

You're with Brian Kilmead. Hey, Brian's off this week. This is Mark Bearden filling in today. I want to talk about the working class in this country. My friend Selena Zito, who wrote the book, The Great Revolt, in the aftermath of what happened with Trump in 2016, she traveled the country.

She saw what was happening. I had people tell me, you know, Trump's going to win. You have blue-collar Democrats that are going to vote for him. And I think to a certain extent, some of this is happening right now. And maybe even with the issue that we just talked about with gender, not necessarily a traditional working class issue, but there are warnings out there for the Democrats.

There's a guy that I like quite a bit. His name is Rai Teixeira. He writes for the Liberal Patriot. He's a Democrat consultant that's been very vocal, sort of along the lines of David Axelrod and Carville, just sort of warning the Democrats that they're not on the page that they should be when it comes to these issues. And in the piece that he wrote a couple of weeks ago relating to the working class, he said, look, this is a working class election.

It's not the working class that see the police as an unnecessary evil and oppose rigorous enforcement of the law for public safety. It's not the working class that believes public consumption of hardware. Drugs should be tolerated. It's not the working class that believes many crimes like shoplifting should be decriminalized because punishing the perpetrators would have disappeared impact. It's not the working class that believes you should never refer to illegal immigrants as illegal and that border security is somehow a racist idea, right?

It's not the working class that believes that an overwhelming surge of migrants at the southern border should be accommodated with asylum claims, parole arrangements, and release into urban areas around the country. And by the way, he wrote this piece probably three weeks ago. It's gotten worse since then in urban areas. It's not the working class that believes competitive admissions and job placements should be allocated on the basis of equity, of race, rather, not merit. And I think that I would pull the.

And I think Ryoda, it's not the working class that thinks sex is assigned at birth and can be changed by self-conception rather than being. An objective biological reality. These are all issues that are not falling along the lines of the Democrats right now. But there are more challenges beyond that. But this is, I think, Rise Right, this is a working class election.

And that gender issue, it's a culture issue, but it's one that independent voters, I think, deeply care about. It has been a thrill filling in for Brian Kilmead. This is the Brian Kilmead Show. Listen to the show ad-free on Fox News Podcast Plus, on Apple Podcast, Amazon Music with your Prime membership, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Mm.