I'd get kicked out to the hall because I'd be
too disagreeable. And I remember some of these
teachers, they were so nasty, they were so left
-wing, they were, some of them were actual communists.
I remember, I went to, again, I went to Wheeling
High School, which is in the suburbs of Chicago.
which was a great school when I went there. Unfortunately,
it's gone incredibly woke the last couple years.
It's so hard to watch. I'm sure a lot of people
in your audience have similar stories of a school
they remember that they went to, and it was just
a normal Midwest school when I went there. Charlie
Kirk is here today. Charlie, so good to see you.
How have you been, brother? Thank you. I've been
great. Thank you, guys. And thank you for your
wonderful support of Liberty and of everything
we're doing at Turning Point USA. So great to
see both of you and honored to be here today.
You know, you've been through a pretty big cancellation
journey. I mean, you've got colleges that will
not allow you to step foot on their campus. Can
you talk to us a little bit about that? Oh, yeah.
I mean, it's just kind of part of the game. You
know, there's many university campuses that will
not allow me or allow Turning Point USA to exist
or to have any sort of presence, including a
lot of the Ivy League schools and a lot of the
schools in the Northeast. But, you know, we take
it in good stride. It actually makes us stronger.
It builds our character. The more that people
try to push back against us or censor us or cancel
us. And, you know, we understand that even even
though that we are in the intellectual minority,
and even though we are not necessarily in control
of these institutions, the more they push back
against us, the stronger we become. Take us back
to Twitter before it was X. It's my understanding
that you were massively shadow banned, and what
that means is that you might have a huge number
of followers, and you post something, but it
gets practically no reach. When did that happen,
and how bad was it? Yeah, it was bad. I mean,
look, I'll tell you that not only that, I lost
access to my Twitter account before Elon actually
purchased it. I was not only shadow banned, but
I said something about Rachel Levine or whatever,
Mr. Levine, the rear admiral who was in the military,
in the Navy, and it was a man who thought he
was a woman, that whole kind of ridiculous situation
that we saw. Yes, that's right. The embodiment
of American health, right, in one picture. And
so I made it. sent out a tweet saying, this is
a man who's pretending he is a woman, and I lost
my Twitter account. And so it was actually one
of the best things that ever happened to me,
because while I was kind of in the wilderness
and I was kind of without a Twitter account,
which, by the way, prior to that, you know, five,
six, seven, eight years prior, I had one of the
most successful Twitter accounts during the Trump
era, very well followed, very engaged, you know,
a lot of social media, let's just say, success
that we enjoyed. And so all of a sudden I was
without a Twitter account. Like, how am I going
to get my message out? Well, we really had to
develop other platforms, other mediums to be
able to spread our message, to be able to kind
of communicate. And that's where we discovered
Rumble. We discovered Getter. We built an even
greater Instagram portfolio. We even expanded
to TikTok. We expanded all sorts of different
platforms. Eventually, by the time Elon bought
Twitter, it only made us even more popular and
more viral. Was there ever a point where. I mean,
I know you, and I probably know the answer to
this, where you were bummed out or dejected or
felt a little bit helpless or hopeless. A little
bit, yeah. I could tell you that there was definitely
a time where when I was kicked off of X, it was
like directionless, right? It was trying to find
my place or trying to find how we were going
to get our voice out. And I wasn't necessarily
worried about... you know are we are we going
to make a difference it was more just about the
audience that we had built there would no longer
be able to hear us and the kind of be able to
nurture you know that kind of um you know that
kind of community and that kind of uh engagement
and so there was definitely a moment after i
lost access to my twitter account and that was
a quite you know long period of time and understand
that you know we we even we knew that we were
being shadow banned we knew that we were being
censored we knew that we were being treated poorly
uh but of course everyone called us conspiracy
theorists at the time and as we joke around just
wait three years every conspiracy theory becomes
true um and so you know this one in particular
we knew that there was some real dark stuff going
on that there was some real nonsense and there
was some real um under the table type of dealings.
Turns out we were right when Elon Musk, and he
deserves such great credit for this, bought Twitter
and liberated the speech in the West and all
the Twitter files, the X files were released.
It turned out that yes, my account was singled
out. for specific censorship and shadow banning.
And we were put on a Twitter blacklist. And so
but again, it only made us have to be more creative,
more entrepreneurial. It required us to be to
not like bend the knee and to. you know because
here's the thing is when i lost access to my
twitter account there was an opportunity that
was presented to us where i could have deleted
the tweet and i could have got my twitter account
back but i refused to do that i said i'm not
going to delete my tweet i'm not going to pander
i'm not going to um you know say something i
don't believe and i'm not going to surrender
just so i can get access to my twitter account
back I think that's the right thing to do. I
mean, we have to stand our ground. If you think
about what has happened to us, I mean, it really
is communism. To cancel a voice of one side of
the equation is the definition of communism.
You know, you've been called all sorts of names,
fascist, racist. How do you deal with that? To
our viewers out there that have been canceled
and have been called these sort of names online,
how do you combat that? What do you do, especially
when you're on campus and you get this extreme
hate thrown at you? Yeah, so there's a really
good quote from my dear friend Dennis Prager,
and we should all pray for Dennis Prager because
he's not in a great place right now. He's going
through a very difficult recovery after a terrible
fall. But Dennis Prager, who's a great friend
and mentor, used to say, if you're in public
life and you are fighting for truth, you do not
allow the compliments to go to your head or the
insults to go to your heart. And it is a beautiful
quote because, honestly, when people insult me,
it means... absolutely nothing like literally
it has no bearing whatsoever on my um on my direction
on my sense of purpose or my sense of identity
is kind of a badge of honor in a lot of different
ways i i just don't care uh what people call
me it means really next to nothing so you know
they call you uh you know six herb which is sexist
intolerant xenophobic you know um you know kind
of the the the acronym of all the different accusations
they could call you and it's just it is a thought
terminating cliche when they throw that at you
they want you to try to shut up it is a form
of censorship and it really is inherently totalitarian
you're loving this I know you she's she's wired
just like you when all this was going down you
if I did my math is correct you must have been
like 22 or 23 with a growing organization how
Were you always like this as a kid, trying to
brush things off? Or did you have to develop
this skill, develop a thick skin? Tell us a little
bit about that. Yeah, it's a good question. I
definitely had to develop. That, you know, when
you're young, you definitely want to be liked
by your friends and you want to be liked by your
community. But there were definitely many moments
as I was growing up where there was conscious
decisions that I made where I decided to take
the road less traveled or the harder path or
the more difficult path regardless of. the kind
of societal or the kind of cost or the price
associated with that. You know, growing up in
high school, I was definitely very outspoken.
I would get in a lot of debates with my teachers.
I'd get kicked out to the hall because I'd be
too disagreeable. And I remember some of these
teachers, they were so nasty. They were so left
wing. They were some of them were actual communists.
I remember I went to again, I went to Wheeling
High School, which is in the suburbs of Chicago.
which was a great school when I went there. Unfortunately,
it's gone incredibly woke the last couple years.
It's so hard to watch. I'm sure a lot of people
in your audience have similar stories of a school
they remember that they went to, and it was just
a normal Midwest school when I went there. A
lot of kids from different backgrounds, a lot
of kids that had diverse views and different
races. I was actually a minority when I went
to my high school. It was a majority Hispanic
high school, but nobody really cared. It was
not a race -obsessed type high school. But growing
up in that environment, despite some of the great
teachers, I learned very quickly that there were
some very, very left -wing teachers, like incredibly,
almost like violent to their views, where they
would do everything they possibly could to prevent
you from speaking, to prevent free speech and
dialogue. And I really developed a sense of not
just purpose, but fortitude to stand up against
them. So censorship is still, you know, going
crazy. I mean, we try and post certain videos,
and now AI basically completely scans, especially
YouTube. You know, and there was one video we
tried to post. Yeah, one of our early episodes.
We posted it, and YouTube gobbled it up and evaluated
it, I'm sure summarized it, decided there was
offending content in there. Would you remember
what it was? So it was very basic, too. It wasn't
even anything... No, I don't remember the episode,
but it set the timestamps of where the offending
continent was and then gave us a strike, all
without human intervention. So cancellation is
going to another level now. When they talk about
the robots controlling us, I think that this
might be one of the first that the robots are
making decisions about what... our voice what
can be heard and what and what can not be heard
so scary and my question is what can we do about
this i want you to can you educate our audience
what how could we fight back what can we do yeah
i mean as far as the youtube question is very
hard i mean we're very popular on youtube we
have millions of subscribers we get over a billion
views on youtube but we have to play the game
i'm very honest with everybody like i mean we
post content that is within their quote unquote
guidelines and we do so intentionally because
we believe the upside of being able to reach
the audience um is greater than the downside
of you know having no channel whatsoever So every
channel, we're posting different types of content,
and we try to funnel it. Look, Google is very
influential. They could do whatever they want.
And look, there have been attempts to try to
build Rumble, and I've been very involved in
trying to get Rumble off the ground and trying
to get Rumble created. We still have a long way
to go there. But look, as far as how we're going
to navigate YouTube, it is a very, very difficult
task. I think the government definitely has some
form of a role. I'm working with the Trump administration
on some of the tech side of that to try to. you
know balance the speech on some of these platforms
and make sure that accounts are being restored
but look it is a problem i hear from a lot of
different people the way we navigate it is that
we just post kind of our more agreeable non -controversial
content on youtube it's not a perfect solution
but if we were to just post everything we would
get three strikes you're out and we'd have no
impact on youtube and that's probably a bad move
given that we're reaching over a billion people
a year and helping change young minds And, you
know, we're very viral. I don't like it. It's
a form of, unfortunately, of self -censorship.
And it is totalitarian in nature. But I will
say, though, that we could say whatever we want
on X. Instagram has improved a lot. Rumble, you
could say whatever you want. And I think that's
a very important thing, that we have to go to
the platforms that reward us and really emphasize
them and make them pinnacles of free speech.
You know, but the government granted special
rights to social media companies. What was it,
the Section 230 or something like that? 230.
Why can't they make it where if they are censoring
people this way, they get that right taken away?
Yeah, they can. They could take away Section
230 protections from the Communication Decency
Act. So just so your audience understands it,
there's two different types of mass communication
companies. You could be a platform or you could
be a publisher. And so a publisher is like the
New York Times or Fox News, which means that
they are liable. They could be held liable and
they are responsible for what is said on their
airwaves. So, for example, if Fox News. or if,
let's just say the New York Times, a great example.
So when the New York Times and CNN went after
that young man from Kentucky, Nicholas Sandman,
and called him all those, do you remember that
whole story with the guy who was banging the
drum in his face and he was wearing the MAGA
hat? The Covington Catholic story, right? That
was like six years ago. And he won a major financial
settlement, right? A significant financial settlement.
because they are liable for what happens on their
communication pathways what a public what a platform
is though is what the communications decency
act did in section 230 is it carved out a separate
caveat, which is that they're not responsible
for what happens on their platform. So Facebook
and Instagram are not responsible for the posts
that are made or the comments that are made.
In some ways, I see that argument. I have some
sympathy for it because there's a lot of lunatics
out there on like comment boards and you don't
want. uh in some ways it would actually be less
pro -free speech however here is what is correct
and this is where you guys are spot on is that
the government has afforded them special privileges
that have allowed them to become multi -trillion
dollar companies and in so far like a great example
is this and is that during covid this was the
most like let's just say easy example because
everyone says oh you know it's not free speech
but no no during covid where there were robust
alternative narratives that were popping up on
how to treat COVID early, on how to intervene.
I mean, you guys know this. You've done wonderful
work, and your school is incredible, and I love
visiting it, and you guys are very health -focused.
But during COVID, and I would make this argument
repeatedly, and I mean this, is that I believe,
I want to make sure, yeah, I would say millions
of people in the world unnecessarily died because
of the lack of free speech how many people's
lives could have been saved with vitamin d supplementation
with an understanding that obesity was leaked
linked to covid with hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin
or quercetin or intravenous therapies or understanding
that a little bit of steroid supplementation
could have helped or that uh that if ventilators
actually were not very good for you and that
early intervention with covet is key all that
stuff right or that actually we shouldn't have
had masks go ahead yeah so that content that
we that we just recorded is that something we
need to remove from our upload to youtube and
what is what is their algorithm going to say
about the stuff you just said uh no but it's
fine so yeah what i just said is back then during
the emergency they literally would not allow
the other side to be to to go out there because
they wanted to direct everybody in one direction
Yeah, but he's saying that if that voice was
heard, then millions of people might have lived.
And so I don't know what the algorithm is going
to say. Like, wow, he just made an allegation
that if this content was on, then... No, no,
no. I'm just curious his thoughts. Well, it depends.
So, no, no, you're not wrong. So I don't know
if you guys plan to post this on YouTube or not,
but I don't seek to try to get you a strike.
But I'm speaking as if this won't be posted on
YouTube. There are some like no -go things on
YouTube. Anything regarding like transgenderism
or like there's some topics that they'll just
give you a strike. The vaccine stuff, they've
actually relaxed a lot in the last year and a
half. I mean, it was totalitarian. It was authoritarian
during COVID. Now it's a little murky. I encourage
your team should just read the community guideline
policy now. But think about during COVID how
immoral it was where you have real doctors, board
certified doctors that are seeing real patients
that are seeing real results. They're saying,
hey, I'm giving hydroxychloroquine. I'm giving
zinc. I'm giving vitamin D. I'm doing all these
different things. And the outcomes are really
good. And you are not allowed to get that message
out. Here's a question for you. Who's writing
your story? You or some random dude on the Internet?
If you're sick of Google, gossip blogs, or that
one angry ex controlling how the world sees you,
it's time to do something about it. Erase .com
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description. Click it. Your future self will
thank you. That is immoral. Now the intent of
the social media companies were, well, if we
allow these other theories, then a lot of people
are going to die. Ironically, a lot of people
died because they didn't allow all these other
theories. And so this is, I still believe that
one of the great... injustices from these social
media companies is the fact of what they did
during COVID and what we allowed them to do to
us. It's one of the great injustices that we've
still allowed us to stand, unfortunately. Well,
even with the vaccines today, you know, like
I have my own show and my own show is only going
to be able to be on Rumble. Why? Because I've
got doctors on my show that I'm interviewing
them and they're going over data. They're going
over Actual facts about you know, and I won't
go to get into it too much because Dave is looking
at me like I want to have an episode on YouTube.
Yeah All of my shows have to go on rumble and
it's it's sad because we need to allow people
to have the information and we need to let them
be adults and make the decision that they want
to make. We cannot force them to listen to one
side of the equation. It's not right. Meanwhile,
on Instagram, there's like pornography. You know,
there's people that are naked. So why are they
the judge and jury? over what gets said. It's
not right. I'm not buying it that they, you know,
they're concerned about, you know, it goes against
the CDC. I think that they're very politically
oriented. They didn't bop. Their biggest client
is far. And I'm not buying, like, you know, Mark
Zuckerberg recently is saying stuff like, well,
you know, it was wrong, and I didn't really agree
with it, but I sort of had to do it. No, he should
have grown a set, you know, at the right time.
It would have done wonders for humanity. Do you
have any thoughts on that? Yeah, look, there's
a lot of differences in where the platforms stand
now. On a spectrum... To Instagram's credit,
which is under Mark's jurisdiction, we could
say a lot more on Instagram than I can say on
YouTube. I want this episode to be posted on
YouTube, so I'll be careful what I say. I don't
want to totally mess with you guys here. Here's
the argument that J .D. Vance especially would
make, and I am sympathetic to it to some regard.
You guys are a trillion -dollar company. You
guys get a lot of government contracts, a lot
of favors from the government. You guys get special
treatment. You should exemplify our birthright
as Americans, which is free speech, period. Now,
their fear is that, oh, there's going to be mass
misinformation. We've had mass misinformation
when you guys have been doing this. Hunter Biden
laptop was mass misinformation, what they said.
Six feet to slow the spread, masks in schools,
shutting down schools. Instead, what we need
is a robust marketplace of speech where the best
ideas can win. I have no idea. I have no problem
with what Elon developed on X, which is like
a community note process where you can have some
feedback based on the post. I actually think
that's pretty healthy. Therefore, if somebody
posts something that is patently wrong, that
is totally off the mark, then you can have like
a factual response to it. The video still stays
up, but at least there's a factual response with
the links. I have no problem with that. Actually,
I don't think that's against free speech. I think
that's more information than people can determine.
But to your astute point, treat us like adults.
Treat us like citizens, not like serfs, not like
slaves, not like servants. And allow us to consume
the information that we so choose. But in the
end, this is the truth. YouTube, Meta, TikTok,
X, these are private companies. And even though
they were given government handouts, they still
are afforded. um private opportunities and so
it's a toughie but i will say though that free
speech is in a far better place on these social
media platforms than it was a couple years ago
yeah i think uh if i owned a social media platform
which i don't i might be like you know what it's
my social media platform and i'm i get to decide
what content i want on it whether it's but at
the end of the day the government is giving you
privileges And so if you've got privileges, you
should also be... Because of the Communications
Decency Act. Yeah, you should also be accountable
to allow both sides to be spoken. I think so.
Yeah, you can't hide behind it. Yeah, it's a
complex issue. I agree. I want to go back a little
bit because... I agree. We do have viewers that
are watching this that have been banned. We actually
have a lot of people on our show that have been
censored. They've been banned. Can you go into
more depth about... what you did. I know you
said you got creative and you went on Rumble
and you went on different platforms, but you're
stronger than ever. You are stronger than you
were even, you know, four years ago. So censorship
didn't stop you at all. So I want to talk about
what you did for mindset and what you did for
resilience and what actions you actually took.
to not stop because i do hear a lot of people
get discouraged and then they don't want to do
anything about it but you were like no you were
a lion you said you know what you're going to
try and censor me i don't think so so share share
with us more details what you did how you did
it well i love that question thank you it's it's
it's very insightful so what during kind of when
we were in the wilderness that's what we call
it i'm a big christian and you know there's the
book of numbers which actually means in the wilderness
so that phrase in the wilderness is uh is very
important um for many ways but we were in the
wilderness for a couple years i remember in the
spring of 2023 It was very difficult. We were
being censored on a lot of platforms. It was
hard to get any traction. I stood firmly by President
Trump. That was when his stock was probably at
its lowest, right? Nobody thought Trump could
win. It was all this nonsense. But I still kept
a very creative and firm mindset. And I remember
I brought my team into a room and I said, we're
not going to complain. Even though we're banned
on all these platforms and even though Elon is
fixing stuff, we've got, not banned, but heavily
censored. We've got to figure something out.
We have to be too big to censor. Kind of like
too big to rig, right? We have to create content
that will be so interesting, that will be so
compelling, that it will matriculate through
the entire internet and people will share it
for us and no matter what the tech titans do,
it's going to penetrate. So I remember I sat
with my team and I asked them I said of all the
stuff that I do and I do a lot I do over 200
public speeches a year. I do two hours of radio
a day. I do I travel the country I do all this
stuff. I asked them I said of all the stuff that
we do. What is the stuff that is most likely
to go viral? and they said well charlie honestly
going back to your roots and not just doing these
campus events where you give a speech but go
with your card table and just take questions
from these students for hours on end and i said
you're right so so basically what we did starting
in the fall of 2023 all the way to today, is
I visited well over 110 college campuses. I've
done well over, I did over like 400 hours of
campus debates. And we would just post these
things online. And it was so overwhelming. And
you guys have probably seen the videos or your
audience has. I mean, well, thank you. They're
hard to get away, right? So the strategy that
we embraced. is we're going to outwork everybody,
we're going to have so much content, we're going
to put it all up on the internet, and everyone
will do the work for us. Everyone will edit it,
they'll splice it, they'll talk about it, they'll
text it, they'll message it, they'll comment
on it. And so actually the censorship was a forcing
function for me and for us to get even more creative,
to push more boundaries. Prior, we were really
relying on traditional communication methods,
just sitting in a studio and talking. I said,
no, we've got to get out into the streets. Let's
make it interesting. Let's make it very provocative.
Let's have the most insane college questions
go to the front of the line. And I was doing
that prior, but nothing at that scale, nothing
at that magnitude, nothing at that kind of infrastructure.
You know, it's very interesting. All of a sudden,
we were doing that. Then we stumbled a year ago,
spring of 2024. We stumbled into, you know, it
was kind of the election was heating up. And
I was used to doing these campus events, and
like 30 kids would show up at lunch, and I would
debate a couple of them, and they would go, you
know. All of a sudden, I'd start showing up at
university campuses last spring, and like 100
kids would show up, and like 200 kids would show
up. And then the fall came during Trump's election,
and like 1 ,000 kids would show up. and then
2 ,000 kids would show up. And then this last
spring, as you guys might have seen, 3 ,000 kids
are showing up and 4 ,000 kids. I mean, no exaggeration,
billions of views. And so, again, as a Christian,
one of my favorite verses is Genesis 50, 20,
which is what the enemy meant for evil God will
use for good. So the enemy meant to censor us
and to intimidate us and to just try to suffocate
us, and it ended up being a tremendous blessing.
Did you have a plan B? I mean, it wasn't the
only idea you put on the whiteboard. No, I mean,
part of it also was, you know, hey, let's do
long -form interviews like Joe Rogan. And we
did all of it. But the thing that just worked
the best was like the good old gritty, grassrootsy
Charlie out there. And it kind of fits my whole
brand because it's the truth. I didn't go to
college. I'm not an overly pretentious guy, right?
i'm not i i i try to be very well read i am an
autodidact right but i'm not really big into
titles or formalities i'm kind of just a tell
it like it is let's get into the essence of the
thing and i kind of embodied that and look the
other thing is that People found it very compelling
because, and they still do, one of the hardest
things you can do is go into an environment with
no notes, no idea what they're going to say,
and a lot of the people in the audience are there
against you. And so it created, yeah, very hostile
with remarkable entertainment value. So, you
know, it's it's fun to watch these. Sometimes
you're like in suspense, like, oh, thank you.
That was a crazy question. What's Charlie going
to say? Right. You know. So do you think that
I love it? So do you think that it became almost
like a sport? You know, like, you know, you're
watching the MMA fighters. You know, is the audience,
is it a good mix of like people against you and
people for you? So is it almost like, do they
feel like they're going to watch a good verbal
fight? Is that what it is? Like, give me some
psychology behind it. No, that's exactly right.
And I didn't quite recognize this until about
eight months ago where when people started to
show up, you know, they wanted to see, you know,
the rumble in the jungle. They wanted to see
Frazier versus Muhammad Ali, right? They wanted
to go see the great heavyweights of UFC kind
of fight it out verbally. and to try to get into
the arena. And it's really fun because, look,
I love it. It's my favorite part of my job. Out
of everything that I do, my favorite thing I
get to do, and I do a lot of stuff. I get to
hang out with the president. I go to the Oval
Office. I'm very blessed, right? But the thing
that if you said, Charlie, what's the one thing
that you hope you never gets taken away from
you is the unpredictable kind of gladiatorial
match that happens when I enter into the Coliseum.
Right. You know, you never know what they're
going to send you. You never know what's going
to come of it. I don't know why anybody would
even want to go up in front of Charlie. That's
like a suicide. But I think that's part of the
excitement for them, you know, is that Charlie's
here. And I know my question is going to be the
question that stops you. Right. Is that what
it is? That's right. yes that's right and and
and part and by the way the audience is so overwhelming
in our favor unless i i did go to cambridge and
everyone was against me in cambridge england
but that's okay that's a separate issue but everybody
was for i go to these campuses and thousands
and thousands of kids are in favor of me um and
it's just it's really overwhelming and very humbling
but yes it's really interesting so if you're
a liberal why do they keep on coming up to the
mic and they do and i it's amazing part of it
is that they part of it Is that they want to
be famous because they know that the video is
going to be seen by a lot of people. And number
two, they want to be the guy that proved me wrong.
And it really is advantage them. Even though
I come with no notes. And, you know, on the appearance,
it looks like Charlie has the advantage, right?
He's been doing this for 13 years. I do it professionally.
I'm a good debater. I know my stuff. I've debated
professors at Oxford, Cambridge. I've debated
Gavin Newsom. I've debated Bill Maher. I've debated
professors at Florida State, University of Florida,
Washington State. I've debated the whole gambit,
right? However, it's actually advantage student
in one way. I don't know what they're going to
bring up. They have unlimited preparation time
and they can have a phone in front of them. They
can bring notes. They could bring a friend. So
it really is in some ways advantage them more
so than people realize. I like that. They could
phone a friend, huh? I like that. I tell them
you could bring up a whole group of people if
you want. That's right. So the moral of this
story is when you're on the ropes. You've got
to go to your war room with your leaders and
figure out, all right, what are we going to do?
How are we going to turn lemons into lemonade?
And come up with all kinds of ideas and work
the system somehow. Find the angles. We had a
guy on the show recently. You might know him.
He owned a gym in California. And he was shut
down during COVID and arrested. The next day,
he shows up, and he started accumulating all
these fines and violations. And he was a lawyer
by training, and he looked into all the new regulations
that the state had issued, and he saw that physical
training places were not limited to the number
of physical. Physical therapy. Physical therapy.
Establishments were not limited in terms of the
number of people that were there and mask requirements
and all that. So one of his members, he was a
doctor, and he got him to sign prescriptions
for every single one of the members that you
need physical therapy. And he became an overnight
physical therapy establishment. And he stayed
open. Very clever. He refused to shut down. And
so I think the moral of the story for anybody
that... is successful in whatever cancellation
journey because literally the government was
canceling businesses, not allowing them to open
because of, you know, the scandemic that was
going around. And this was happening mainly in
blue states, right? Only, yeah. Mainly. I mean,
the, you know, red states, we were fine. We're
lucky enough to be in Florida. And so, you know,
it's really that. Is the desire to, okay, you
want to shut me down? I'm going to fight harder
and I'm going to get creative and I'm not going
to bow down to you just because you said you
can't do this or do that. And I think that's
a very valuable lesson. That's exactly right.
Is that something you share? I think that's right.
And go ahead. No, go ahead. No, please finish
the question. I'm sorry. No, no, no, go ahead.
No, no, go. No. Yes. And so. The greatest form
of cancellation is self -cancellation. When you
decide you're done, when you surrender. No one
can actually cancel you unless they kill you
or they put you in jail or something totally
extreme. But, I mean, you look at, again, I have
great, I'm very close with the president. and
i think he's amazing and honored to call him
a friend and you think of what he's been through
they try to take his business empire from him
facing 700 years in federal prison smeared slandered
shot almost shot again the only way that he was
going to lose was if he gave up and i just i
think that is so inspiring uh because that is
ultimately what the enemy wants from you they
want they want the white flag they want surrender
and it's incumbent on us to never give up One
of my dreams is to have President Trump on this
show because he has probably the most canceled
story in the history of mankind. And Bobby Kennedy,
who is a friend who has said he'll be on, so
we're trying to get him on relatively soon. These
guys are an inspiration to me because they've
been through the ringer like crazy and rose from
the ashes. Their stories are remarkable. Yeah,
and, you know, I think, you know, if you think
about all the shows that we've done, the same
theme has been to fight, fight, fight. It was
just recently I was watching the Queen Esther
story with my girls. And if you think about her
story, right, she had to stand up. Share the
story. Queen Esther is the story of, you know,
where they tried to eradicate the Jews because
of one guy. who didn't like the jews haman haman
and um you know queen esther was jewish but her
husband the king had no idea because she was
an orphan and she had an opportunity to make
a change to do something big and she knew if
she were to speak to the king without permission
she could have been killed he could have basically
banished her and killed her But because of her
saying, no, I'm going to fight and I'm going
to say something, she literally saved the Jews.
She saved them with her voice, with her commitment
to fight. And for such a time as this, as it
says in the book of Esther, that's exactly right.
Exactly. And that's what her cousin said. If
you're not going to fight now, you were born
for this. And so the message I try and give people.
is we were born for this the time to fight is
now not tomorrow not yesterday now and if we
allow them to continue to do what they're doing
they will do more and more and more the jews
could have been completely obliterated if she
did not stand up and fight back that's right
You know, this conversation is very United States
of America -centric. I think that people living
in other countries don't even have a choice to
fight, or it's so socialist. Do you have any
thoughts on that? Let's say you're living in,
I don't know, France, for example, just to pick
on France. What would you do there if you were
just a citizen who lost his voice? It's such
a good question. So, yeah, again, I just recently
traveled to the United Kingdom, which is a husk
of its former self. It's very hard to see what
the UK has become. Do you know the United Kingdom
arrests 30 people a day for offensive social
media posts? You guys would both be in prison
by now. That's true. Yours are offensive. My
posts are not that offensive. You're the offensive
one. 30 people. That's right. 30 people a day.
30 people a day that are arrested for offensive
social media posts. So what do you do about that?
I don't have a great answer other than you have
to try to win elections and then change that.
And I want to also just speak to the American
audience, and I'll go back to international.
Everybody watching, do you know how lucky you
are, how blessed we are to have the speech protections
that we have? Yes. We might be censored on social
media at times, but we have it so much better,
everybody, than these other countries because
it creates demoralization. It creates dissension.
It creates division. And so, yes, the only solution
that I've come up with, which is a very radical
one, and I did my best to get arrested when I
went to the UK and I failed, but which is to
try and get, you need to get a mass movement.
of millions of people in France or the UK and
you basically just say you can't arrest us all.
And you just need to just push the law to its
logical extreme and you have to overwhelm the
system. It's the only solution that I have, but
they are the thought police. It's happened all
across continental Europe. Look at the convoy
truckers in Canada. I'm sure you're familiar
with that. Correct. I loved it. It was great
entertainment. We supported them. They got all
the way to, I don't know where it was, Ottawa
or something like that. And man, they got shut
down so harsh, so fast. They locked up their
bank accounts. They froze the funding. And then
that was it. It fizzled. It went away. And that
was a mass movement. But yes, and this is where
we are different. And that's why, look, there's
something special. There's something divine.
There's something inexplicable about the United
States of America, which is that there's something
where we dig deep. You understand how miraculous
it is that Trump became president. I hope everyone
understands that. In Canada, they go after the
truckers. The country just kind of takes it.
France, in the United Kingdom, they do Brexit,
and now they're repealing it, and nobody cares.
Like, okay, fine. In America, we don't put up
with that. And Trump was our symbol that we don't
put up with it. More than anything else, it was
just a symbol that, no, the people are still
in charge and not you, and you're going to have
to take it. And so pretty awesome stuff. I don't
lie, so I'm not going to lie to your audience.
It's really dark right now in other Western countries
when it comes to freedom of speech. Yeah, I mean,
I never imagined Canada. To resemble China as
close as it does. I thought they were like us.
And I'm not alone. Yeah. Yeah. We thought. We
thought for sure. Yeah, it showed their true
color. All these countries showed their true
colors. Australia, they had no clue that Australia
was wired like that. You know, you came to our
school, so you know a little bit about our cancellation
journey. I stood up. Very impressive. against
the covet shot and i did not want my teachers
to get it i did not want our kids to get it and
they really tried to cancel me from here what
you say by the way i've found a youtube video
so just edit yourself but they tried to cancel
us from from here to literally russia i mean
they were camped outside our door the media they
were they were they were grueling they were absolutely
monsters But I don't know if you know this, and
this is what's even crazier, is the federal government
called me up. There are lawyers. Part of the
Disabilities Act. It was the F something. I don't
even remember the name of the branch. And basically
said to me, we're considering indicting you,
me, basically for not wanting the teachers to
get the shot. And I go, what do you mean? I never
fired anybody. They quit on their own. Yeah,
yeah, but it doesn't matter, they say to me.
It doesn't matter. We have teachers that quit
that are very upset that you didn't want them
to get the shot. I go, but I didn't fire them.
Do you understand what I'm saying? You cannot
find one teacher that I actually fired. I did
quarantine one. I did. And she still works for
me today, you know. But I go, but, but. schools
all over the country were firing teachers if
they didn't get it. They were firing them. So
you're going to go after me and you're not going
after any of them? So anyways, I had my attorney
sitting there. Her attorney advising her to handle
it in a certain way, which... My attorney was
kicking me under the foot because the lawyer
that was on the other side of the camera was
a Chinese guy, a Chinese lawyer working for the
federal government. And I looked him on the eyes
in Zoom and I said, the last time I checked,
we are not officially a communist country. So
you cannot tell me what to say to my teachers.
And I'm not a public company. I'm a private school.
Okay. So he says to me after this, okay, well,
we're going to get back to you and we're going
to let you know what we decide to do. I'm like,
you can get back to me all you want. I will spend
millions of dollars in legal fees if I have to.
I will not comply. I am not going to allow you
to bully me, right? Okay, so fast forward, fast
forward. He calls me back with an offer, you
know, I don't know, months later, weeks later,
whatever it was. You want to know what the offer
was? For us to pay $80 ,000 in fines, okay, and
for five years we're on probation and they get
to watch our every move. I was like, what? Wow.
Tell me the crime that I've committed, first
of all, because you still haven't told me. Okay?
So anyways, I told them. Unbelievable. I told
them if I have to go to jail, if I have to do
whatever it takes to show the world that I'm
not going to stand down and you will not bully
me, I'll do it. And I'm not paying the $80 ,000.
So if you want to indict me, let's go. She told
him to pounce in, basically. Incredible. Six
weeks later, they dropped the charges. Good for
you. Good for her. But more people need to do
that. More people need to stand up to these bullies.
And you know what? You might get arrested. You
know what? You might serve time. But at the end
of the day, what are we alive for if not to stand
up for our rights? You know, I love our country.
I still believe that we live in the best country
on earth. By the grace of God, we're just lucky
to be here. And the streets are still paved with
gold, so I have very little patience for people
who feel entitled. And, you know, your life's
journey can change in a moment's notice. And
we have to stand in our truth, whatever that
may be. And people need to grow a spine. This
does not come naturally to me, like maybe to
you, Charlie, or her. I had to learn. to live
in my truth. And the next time something comes
along, I am going to stand firmly knowing that
my life might get pretty difficult. Maybe my
assets will be taken away. I have no idea, but
I know I have to live in my truth. I have to
do what's right. Why? Because if I don't, it's
a terrible example for my kids, a terrible example
for everybody else, and then the bullies will
have their way. We have to stand up for ourselves.
We have to. So my question for you, Charlie,
is for people listening to this show who are
scared to speak their mind, who are scared to
do something, what advice do you have for them?
It's a great question. The cool thing about courage
is that it actually doesn't require any talent.
It is just a choice. That's it. you have to choose
to be courageous. It's a very unusual thing where
almost every, a lot of things in life have to
do with, well, I don't have enough money. I don't
have enough. Nope. Courage is different. You
could just choose to be courageous. You could
say today I'm going to be courageous and everyone
knows what courage is. Courage is doing the right
thing when you don't know how it's going to work
out. That is courage. So you do the right thing
when there is some aura and some element of unpredictability.
For example, There's nothing courageous with
us doing this podcast right now. It's pretty
awesome, right? It's fun, but there's really
not like a ton of downside. But you know what
would be courageous? Courageous is what your
story is about potentially going to jail. You
don't know how that one's going to work out.
Courageous is showing up on a college campus
where they might shoot us or they might scream
at us. So when there is risk, when there is uncertainty,
that is when courage comes in. i would so so
it's a great question you ask and i don't quite
know the answer so i'm still trying to figure
it out how do you create more courage in a generation
that is so lacking it the best answer that i
can give is that We must find other role models
and find other stories of the past of courageous
people and raise our children in those stories.
One of the reasons why I think we have a lack
of courage is we've gotten rid of some of the
stories that built the West from King David to
Abraham to Winston Churchill to Abraham Lincoln
and from Donald Trump. Some of the great heroes
that have built our civilization, men and women
full of courage. We need to teach our young people
about that. You bring up a great point, just
that my wheels are spinning as you're talking.
I think we need to introduce some curriculum
into our school center academy. We teach them
grit and determination, but I don't think we're
teaching them courage. Courage, that's a good
one. Right? And that's the reason why I was reading
the story of Queen Esther to our kids. I wanted
to teach them what a role model of courage looks
like, the definition of courage. It was literally
a decision that could have meant death, and she
still chose to speak up. I have another question
for you. And courage is what? Yeah, go ahead.
Go ahead. No, no, you go ahead. Tell me. Courage
is what? No, I was going to say courage is one
of the highest. It's one of the highest of all
the virtues. Aristotle said courage is the greatest
of all the virtues. Without courage, there are
no other virtues. It makes a lot of sense. If
you're not courageous, then you cannot have temperance.
You cannot have prudence. You cannot have honesty.
Courage is the virtue that begets the other.
But please, your question. My question is for
you. What have been the blessings in disguise?
First, of course, besides the one you gave us
already, which was being canceled off X, that
was a major blessing in disguise because it allowed
you to, forced you to be creative, forced you
to think outside the box. It forced you to open
more channels. Any other blessings in disguise
that you have from what you've been experiencing
over the last couple of years? Yeah, I mean,
I'll give you a big one that at the time it felt
like the world was falling apart, but it turned
out to be a great blessing for me and amazingly
the country, which was when Donald Trump didn't
win. I didn't win. Whatever you want to say back
in 2020. Right. It was it was messy, but he did
not remain as president. Let's put it that way.
And that ended up being a great blessing and
made our movement stronger and made us really
understand why we're fighting for and what we're
fighting for it. It was a blessing in disguise
that made Turning Point USA a better organization.
It made me a better leader. And it really made
us dig out of an immense hole and bring us all
the way back to the White House. That's a great
answer. Why don't you do a little shameless plug
for Turning Point. Turning Point was a tremendous
factor in Trump winning the election. Maybe give
us a couple data points on how that actually
played out, Turning Point's contribution to that.
Do you understand the question? Yeah, sorry,
you cut out just, yeah, you just cut out for
one second. Can you repeat that? I'm not sure
what happened. I'll say the question again. Why
don't you do a little shameless plug for Turning
Point? Turning Point was very influential in
President Trump winning the recent election.
Give us maybe some data points or anecdotes of
Turning Point's influence and how that came to
be. Yeah, and the fact that you were out there
on the ground. Yeah, so we had well over 1 ,000
ballot chasers in the key battleground states.
We chased hundreds of thousands of ballots in
Arizona, Wisconsin. Arizona, where I am right
now and where I live, was the best performing
swing state for Donald Trump. Nearly a seven
point victory, nearly 200 ,000 vote victory for
Donald Trump. And so what we did on the ballot
chasing side was enormous and historic. Also,
though, what we did with young people, we believe
made the difference. If young people would have
voted the same way that they did in 2000, then
Donald Trump would not have been president. Let
me say that again. If young people would have
voted the same way that they did in 2020, Kamala
Harris would have become president. We went to
college campuses. We organized them. Young people
moved in a dramatic 20 -point swing. President
Trump won the youth vote in Michigan, largely
thanks to our outreach and what we were doing,
but also the president deserves the enormous
credit. We were able to play a small role, and
the whole world was against us, and all the odds
were stacked against us. and we were able to
accomplish something historic and vast of great
magnitude. And again, so if anyone wants to get
involved with Turning Point USA, we believe we
are the most effective, the greatest culture
transformation organization in the country from
a high school standpoint, a college standpoint,
and from a political action standpoint. And a
lot of people say that Turning Point played one
of the most decisive roles back in this last
election, and the data proves it. And where can
our viewers find you? TPUSA .com or also Turning
Point. We'll put it in the show notes, but go
ahead and give us some. Yeah, no, TPUSA .com
or Turning Point Actions, tpaction .com. They
can also check out my website, charliekirk .com,
also the Charlie Kirk Show podcast. We do two
hours live every day at 12 Eastern. People are
welcome to support and follow us. So I have another
question for you. What are your thoughts on what
in the world is going on with this Elon Musk,
President Trump debacle? I need to hear what
your thoughts are. I bet you know both, I'm sure.
I know them both very well, and I like them both.
I hope that they find some remedy and reconciliation.
I'm actually bullish that they will. I first
just have to say I'm so glad Elon bought Twitter
and bought X. You just deserve such credit for
that. Some of the accusations he's been throwing
towards Trump are unfounded, and I don't like
what he's been saying. The Epstein thing is just
outrageous and ridiculous. I don't want to get
into that, but it's not good. I will say, though,
it's a war of words. I think things are going
to calm down. I don't think there's actually
the schism that people think. And look, President
Donald Trump, he's created such an amazing movement.
Elon certainly helped. But President Trump deserves
the credit when all chips are down. But the left
would like nothing more than from a big war of
the world's wealthiest man and the world's most
powerful man. So I think things are going to
simmer down a little bit. And I think that these
two titans are going to make peace soon. Maybe
you can be the mediator in a room to get them
to, you know, hug and make up. Since you know
both of them, maybe you can help make that happen.
You think? Well, I don't know if I'm that powerful,
but I do know both of them. I have a good relationship
with both of them. I've spent a good amount of
time with both of them. Look, men are funny.
Men don't hold grudges quite like women. Men
can fight one day and insult another, and then
they'll go get a beer the next day. That's true.
Women will remember something negative said about
them 25 years ago and hold that grudge for another
decade. I can agree with that. You're an amazing
guest. I really enjoyed our time with you. I
do want to be clear. This is not a right -leaning
show. It doesn't matter what our perspectives
are. There's people that are being canceled.
all across the spectrum, falsely accused of sexual
misconduct, or we had a guest on here who went
to prison for 28 years for a murder he didn't
do. I mean, that's like one of the ultimate cancellations.
So for our audience members out there, we intend
on bringing in all kinds of people, all flavors
of cancellation. Of course. I just want to put
that out there. Yeah, definitely. Well, thank
you guys. And thank you. We appreciate that.
And you guys are great patriots. And I love the
Centenar Academy. Want to visit again soon. And
this is a great honor. Thank you both. Thank
you so much, Charlie. You're the best. We really
appreciate having you on our show. And you've
been amazing. And thank you for all that you
are doing for our youth. And thank you for being
so bold and brave and sharing some incredible
insights with our viewers. And you have a quick
question for him? Absolutely. Thank you. So what
do you think of this show, Charlie? Oh, this
is for Instagram, right? Okay. Got it. No, not
yet. This is not for Instagram. I love a race.
This one's not for Instagram. This is just for
the show. Let me ask it again. Ready? Go. Yeah.
So what do you think of the show, Charlie? I
love it. People should watch it. It's fun. It's
provocative. And it's principled. You should
check out Erased. I love it. And you guys will
really enjoy it. Thank you Charlie. Have a great
evening.