A brave new world of media and politics: Natalie Winters and Adam Mockler

Natalie Winters, co-host of Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast, and Adam Mockler, host of “The Adam Mockler Show” on YouTube, join Margaret Hoover for a discussion at Hofstra University about how their generation views politics and media.

Winters, 24, defends her approach to reporting and denounces the “anti-disinformation industry” that she believes silences alternative views. She also addresses rifts within the Republican Party revealed by a recent clash between President Trump and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

Mockler, 23, explains why authenticity attracts audiences online and reflects on the state of the Democratic Party, which he thinks should embrace aspects of both moderation and populism to succeed.

The commentators debate President Trump’s immigration policies and broader attitudes toward immigration and assimilation.

Winters and Mockler also take questions from Hofstra students about accountability in journalism, algorithms that promote extreme content, and desensitization toward tragedy.

Support for Firing Line with Margaret Hoover is provided by Robert Granieri, Vanessa and Henry Cornell, The Fairweather Foundation, The Tepper Foundation, Peter and Mary Kalikow, The Beth and Ravenel Curry Foundation, Pritzker Military Foundation, Cliff and Laurel Asness, Katharine J. Rayner, Charles R. Schwab, Lindsay and George Billingsley, The Meadowlark Foundation, Jared Stone, and Al and Kathy Hubbard.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
The algorithms currently incentivize and promote the most
outrageous content. I think this gives us a warped
perception of each other and I think it quite frankly allows
extremists to control the media message and it elects
extremists. I don't think it's the platforms
that are making us more extreme,I think it's the lived economic
experience of Americans that is driving them to left and right

(00:22):
wing populism. That's Adam Mockler and Natalie
Winters, two Gen. Z commentators from opposite
sides of the political spectrum.I'm Margaret Hoover.
This is the FIRING Line podcast.Natalie Winters is the Co host

(00:43):
and White House correspondent for Steve Bannon's War Room
podcast. They tried to censor you.
They tried to jail you, they tried to debank you.
They tried to de platform you. They have no interest in
compromising with you. Adam Mockler is a liberal
content creator with more than 1.8 million subscribers on
YouTube. Knocking the Republican Party
off of the chess board in the 2026 midterms is only one step

(01:05):
of a longer battle, a longer strategy.
And they're both in their early 20s.
I sat down with Natalie and Adamin front of a student audience
at Hofstra University to talk about how media is evolving.
We are now in a post factual reality where we can't even
agree on fundamental things likedid this person win this
election, is COVID real, is thisreal?

(01:25):
This notion of a Fact Check, I think we use very loaded terms
that connote this sort of agnostic sentence.
Wait. Do you think the term Fact Check
is loaded what the major political parties are getting
wrong? What I want to do is return to a
Democratic Party that is not so risk averse, that is more
authentic, and that can speak tothe average American without
always being so condescending. The Republican Party, it's no

(01:46):
secret, they're run by their donors, they're run by special
interests. They like open borders.
They like illegal immigration because it's cheap labor.
And where America's immigration debate is heading.
This administration is absolutely looking at
immigration through a racial lens.
They are banning countries from coming in, people from countries
that are black or that look a certain way.
I can't sit here and say I want to live in Somalia and say that
Somalia is the same as America because it's not.

(02:08):
And maybe that's an uncomfortable or racist thing to
say. It's not.
It's true. Natalie Winters, Adam Mockler,
welcome to FIRING Line here at Hofstra University in front of a
student audience. It's wonderful to welcome you
both here. Thank you for having us.
Thank you. You are both online political

(02:29):
phenomenon. Adam, you host the Adam Mockler
Show on YouTube which has a subscribership of more than 1.8
million subscribers. Natalie, you are the Co host of
Steve Bannon's War Room at the ripe age of 24 and you at the
ripe age of 23 have garnered almost unprecedented mainstream

(02:52):
media attention and digital media attention.
This is this is a time, as you guys know, of really intense
disruption in media and each of you in your massive followings
have developed a degree of trustwith your audience at a time
when trust in media has plummeted.

(03:15):
Why do your audiences, I'm goingto go to both of you.
Why do they trust you? Well, I think it's not just that
we cover issues that Americans actually care about in a way
that's truly factual, but we cover the issues that I think
for so long legacy media has just routinely ignored.
I think you can sort of see the convergence of that with what
President Trump talked about in 2016, which was immigration,

(03:37):
trade deals, and the idea that our government should actually
work to represent us and not be importing a sort of class of
foreign workers, depressing our wages, and just, I think,
destroying what it means to be an American.
So I think maximizing this idea of American identity and what it
means culturally, economically, particularly I think through
immigration policy is something that I think we have really

(03:58):
resonated with our audience on. But I also think even in
general, what shapes the media environment, Everybody treats
media like it is this own isolated vacuum.
I think a lot of our coverage has been on the mass censorship
that our audience has seen, the routine algorithmic throttling
and nuking of 10s of millions ofaccounts of people who watch our
shows. And we've really, I think dug

(04:19):
into what is I think most concerning the way that the
federal government has funded a lot of these programs and sort
of exposing the actual weaponization of government that
our viewers tax dollars are going to and funding.
So if I understand you correctly, I think what you've
just said is you're covering issues that resonate with your
viewers and that's how you've developed trust in them.

(04:40):
That the, the, the, the areas that you're covering
journalistically are the areas that they're most concerned
about. And that's what's allowed you to
develop a bond of trust with your viewers.
Yeah, I mean this idea of a a silent majority or terms like
that that you hear about, I think that that is sort of in a
weird way, it's like almost victim blaming.
It's the idea that Americans arenot allowed to care about

(05:01):
certain issues or they're, you know, demeaned as nativist,
xenophobic, racist every IST or at home in an attack in the
book. And I think war Room, I think
sort of alternative, at least conservative media actually
says, no, it's OK to care about wanting to be an American and
not having your government replace you with a bunch of
foreigners. That's not a racist thing.
The idea that America your valueyou as a citizen, you should not

(05:24):
have your government working to actively subvert your ability to
have just a nice life and not a life of economic stagnation, a
life of economic woe, and a lifewhere your government is quite
literally using your tax dollarsto fund and prop up programs,
infrastructure, apparatus. Whether from the weaponization

(05:45):
perspective, the censorship perspective that is directly
negatively impacting your life. OK.
I'm going to ask Adam the same question.
Adam, what do you do that has developed trust with your
viewers? I think in this new age of media
where mainstream media is losingviewership and people are
migrating to digital media, people are looking for

(06:05):
authenticity. The Democratic Party, which I
oftentimes represent in my videos, has built up a
reputation of being a few thingsrisk averse and a little bit
finger waggy in people's faces, always trying to tell people
what to say or what not to say, right?
So as somebody in this Democratic sphere, I try to
bring an authentic view. People don't always want to see
me in suits on TV like I am now.Sometimes I'm just in my bedroom

(06:28):
telling it how it is. It's saying what the story of
the day is and that is authenticto people and that.
Helps you build trust. I think the authenticity has
helped me be. Sure helps you build.
Trust. Absolutely.
On the day after the election, after the Democrats lost, I
hopped in in a hoodie and I was down to earth talking to my
audience about what this means for the next year.
Now, they could have turned on mainstream media and seeing
somebody with a suit and a production set around them

(06:50):
basically reading off a teleprompter script, But I was
sitting there with them, talkingto them.
So we, it feels like we come at an angle that mainstream media
oftentimes fails to come at a lot of different networks that
I've been on try to both sides issues in such a way where they
give way too much charitability to one side.
So we are just making sure that we are spreading a an

(07:12):
unapologetic pro democracy message without sane washing
anything that is happening on the other side and just telling
it how it is. And I think in the media
environment that we exist in right now is an uphill battle
for Democrats just due to who owns things.
Elon Musk owns the largest social media platform, X, which
has the most monthly impressions.
Now X is very clearly algorithmically changed by Elon

(07:33):
Musk to boost some stuff, to notboost some stuff.
I mean, Elon Musk has attacked people on Twitter, and then you
see their viewership completely plummet.
So we're building a media infrastructure in an environment
where the Democrats have been losing, where it's almost like a
Sisyphicine task, a Sisyphine task.
Every morning we have to push a boulder up a hill, and then the
next morning we wake up and ElonMusk has already spread 102

(07:55):
hundred tweets of disinformation.
And it's on us to push back on that.
I know you disagree with that. That's OK.
Here's what I mean. One of the things that one of
the critic like criticisms you get from people who follow you
is, is often you'll go on with people who represent America
first or MAGA, or you take on their positions or you go on
with them. And some of the criticism you
get is that you're platforming people with that point of view.

(08:19):
To which I have heard you say, you know, Charlie Kirk is the
heir, right? It's because people would say
Charlie Kirk is in there, why are you platforming him?
May he rest in peace. But for people who represent
that position, your argument is what?
Politics is sales. You are trying to sell your
ideology and the Democratic Party, as I've said, has failed
to sell our ideology in multipleelections.

(08:40):
Even when Joe Biden won, we barely, barely won.
It was like 11,000 votes in Georgia that decided part of the
election. So you put it perfectly.
Obviously, rest in peace, Charlie Kirk.
That was a tragedy. But when people in the comment
section say why are you giving air to Charlie Kirk, why do you
give air to Ben Shapiro, I say they are the air.
They have the presidency, they have all of Congress right now.
We are the ones in the uphill battle trying to sell our ideas.

(09:03):
So I don't agree that just by talking to a fellow American
about your beliefs who are platforming them, I'm talking to
somebody that represents a very real section of the country.
When I'm talking to people on CNN and debating them, these are
very real people they represent.So the premise that you're
operating under is that people can be persuaded absolutely.
Okay, that's what America has found.
Or that you and you agree that debating is that's the that

(09:29):
civil contest of idea is the area in which you that's where
you want the fight to be. It depends.
It could be civil, sometimes it gets heated.
But in this current information environment, short form content
is very, very important. 86% of Gen.
Z ers get their data through some sort of get their news
through some sort of short form content, whether that be on
TikTok, whether that be on Instagram or even like YouTube

(09:52):
Reels. They get their news from some
sort of short form content. So yeah, it's very important.
We're meeting people where they are with explosive channels to
push our narrative. I think a few creators that I
can mention that I'm sure everyone in this room knows of
is Dean Withers. He's my friend and he posts a
lot of stuff on TikTok. That's just 62nd clips, but
those 62nd clips allow us to push a narrative that oftentimes

(10:14):
isn't seen, isn't represented inthe media.
OK, the fact that the majority of young Americans get their
news through social media, some sense of social media short form
video, as you said, you know, all these non traditional forms
of media are how people are, especially young people, Gen.
Z are getting their news. The the concern older people

(10:37):
have, I will speak for older people, right?
No, but the, the concern right, is that in the old world, there
were journalistic standards at mainstream media organizations
that somehow, even though certainly there were inherent
biases that were maybe not disclosed or maybe not there,
there were some kind of biases baked in.

(10:59):
There was at least this ideal for attempting to discern what
the truth is and correct the record if they if you got it
wrong. And this this notion, which may
seem antiquated of, of journalistic standards.
So in the context of the digitalmedia spaces where both of you
exist, what kind of standards doyou both apply to yourselves and

(11:22):
try? You sort of aspire to You go
first. Sure.
Well, I think the notion that the left is fighting a cultural
uphill battle is just laughably absurd, whether from mainstream
culture perspective, just the way, well, I would say between
the former predecessor owner of Twitter and Elon Musk, there's
only one of those people who have open sourced their
algorithm and it wasn't the former.

(11:44):
The former algorithm was only exposed through the Twitter
Files where we saw the routine abuse and use of trust and
safety teams liaising with government agencies through DHS,
like CISA, to use terms like youjust mentioned, misinformation,
misinformation to censor narratives that we now know are
true. Whether it was about the origins
of COVID, whether it was just average everyday Americans

(12:04):
voicing questions and concerns, totally fine about election
integrity, about COVID vaccines,just asking questions and they
were naked. And we saw back in 2017,
governments colluding and collaborating using tax dollars
to set up whether it was abroad in the European Union, the
Digital Services Act, whether here you saw a whole new
information and grant industry developed trying to combat

(12:27):
misinformation whereby they label the type of information
that my show shares as inaccurate and incorrect so they
can then censor it. War Room is banned on YouTube.
We were banned on Spotify. We've been pulled down from so
many platforms. And I would just push back on
this idea that journalistic standards are something that
should be adhered to with the way that they are currently

(12:48):
defined. Well, because, because the the
media environment, I think is a reflection of this sort of
populist surge in politics wherethe power does not rest with the
traditional authorities, the trust, the experts class.
It rests with people who are doing actual work, who are doing
actual true open source reporting.
Populism is not anti editorial. Or rather, it's not anti

(13:08):
intellectual, it's anti editorial.
OK. So my question though for you
is, and it's for both of you, but my question actually though
is what just personally, what journalistic standards or what
standards do you adhere to as you go about gathering
information and disseminating it?
Most of my work is directly quoting whether it's government

(13:28):
grants. A lot of my early research had
to do with Chinese Communist Party infiltration.
I would spend hours and deleted web pages going to the
translated web page just quotingthe Chinese Communist Party, as
is these foreign influence groups, the Americans that they
were meeting with. I've always just done primary
raw source reporting and have have carried through it's, it's

(13:49):
indisputable. So how do you?
How do you characterize characterize the standards that
you hold yourself to? I just report the truth and I I
think that, but I think that allthis focus on on standards, I
think is sort of this bureaucratic kind of not gotcha.
But where it's all about imposing this sort of idea that

(14:12):
in order for a story to be accurate, it has to be fact
checked, it has to be peer reviewed.
It has to have this whole kind of but it.
Doesn't have to be fact checked.I mean, you just said you spend
a lot of time finding facts. They're just facts.
I think the concept of a Fact Check is completely.
You mean independent third partyFact Check?
But then but the point is even attaching that label of
independent and 3rd party the fact checking.

(14:33):
Fact. The fact that this notion of a
Fact Check, I think we use very loaded terms that connote this
sort of agnostic sense. Do you think the term Fact Check
is loaded? 100%.
Tell me why. It was a a construct that was
created by this sort of anti disinformation industry which I.
Would it? Shouldn't be we we should be
against disinformation. Wait, tell me about the

(14:54):
disinformation industry. I think I think we should have
things matter here, Yeah, Because I think all of our
definitions of disinformation, right, would differ.
And when you say fact checks aregood, disinformation is good.
I would sit here and say, you know what?
COVID-19 originated in the WuhanInstitute of Virology.
It was a Chinese Communist Partycreated virus and for years I
would have been fact checked andcalled a crazy conspiracy

(15:15):
theorist when in reality. 1st, that's definitely true.
On the first part, it's definitely true.
I think we, I think, well, we don't know for sure.
Any governance. Party run lab well.
So that fair, fair and but thereI mean there are still
outstanding questions about whether it was mistakenly
conceived or or intentionally conceived.
I was fact checked multiple times for reporting on that
issue by an allegedly independent third party fact

(15:36):
checker that when I found out the source that they quoted was
actually the Wuhan Institute of Virology themselves.
So my point, my point being factchecking is great, we should
check facts, but I think it's important to understand who is
actually doing because I think there's a weaponization of these
terms that there's this implied neutrality that the people who
are checking your facts are people who have no bias.

(15:59):
But then that's not true. I, I think, I think you make a
very fairpoint. So then quote Daniel Patrick
Moynihan, a former Democratic senator, he said, you know,
everybody is entitled to their own opinions, but not their own
facts. I mean, is it the case then that
through a series of fact checking and then agreeing upon
who the sources are not or sources are those facts that we

(16:20):
might actually agree on a set offacts, consistent facts that we
can then debate? But the point of fact checks,
they have really only ever been weaponized.
Fact checks in the mainstream media, like politics, they've.
Only ever been weaponized to pull content down.
Fact checks have only ever been weaponized to silence content
that doesn't fit mainstream narrative.
OK, I'm going to get you in here, but I just want to say,

(16:41):
remember, the point of the question was me just saying what
standards do you use and what doyou apply to yourself?
And I think what you, yeah, but I was just saying like, what
kind of journal you call yourself a journalist?
What kind of journalistic standards do you apply to
yourself? And basically what you explained
is that you're just going to hard sources, you're just going
to things that we could agree onare facts after going to the

(17:02):
sources and then you're using those facts to do your reporting
and then Give your opinion analysis.
Is that fair? Yes.
Okay, Adam, take it away. There's a lot I want to respond
to first of all, before we jump into standards.
I think that everyone should disagree with government
overreach and government weaponization.
I disagree with government overreach.
But I don't think you can compare the FBI reaching out to

(17:23):
Twitter and saying, hey, maybe there shouldn't be massive lies
about COVID. Maybe we shouldn't allow massive
lies about widespread election fraud that doesn't exist.
And maybe we shouldn't be spreading potential Russian
stories like 2 months before theelection.
The idea that you can compare that to Elon Musk, Donald
Trump's largest donor, he donated hundreds of millions of
dollars, then buying a social media, a platform in order to

(17:45):
leverage that social media platform and elect that
president. This is a entirely different.
And then Elon Musk on top of that gets a position within the
government. So again, the FBI when it
reached out to Twitter and requested that certain
information is taken down. Maybe it's because some people
don't understand the difference between facts and fiction in

(18:06):
regards to COVID and in regards to the election.
So when people are spreading election lies and it's the
president of the United States and and Twitter decides to
remove that account, I don't even think that's much
suppression. OK, now, now, hold on now, now
we're going to we're going to hold on the 2020 Stop the Steel.
And I'm just going to ask you, yeah.
What journalistic standards do you apply to yourself as you

(18:29):
internalize information and disseminate it to your audience?
To get to the heart of the question, I think that there is
a difference in mainstream mediaand digital media in that
authenticity sometimes means there aren't as many hoops that
you have to jump through. So when I'm making a video, I am
and my team, we are the ones that Fact Check this video.
We're the ones that make sure everything.
Fact checks a very loaded term, Yeah.

(18:49):
What do you mean by Fact Check? The real effort?
OK, yeah. So first of all, I don't even
consider myself a journalist. I'm a political commentator,
which is. Fair.
And maybe I shouldn't have said journal.
What journalistic standards do you hold yourself?
But what standards do you have applied yourself so.
The standards that I apply to myself is I make sure everything
I am reporting is at least coming from something that is
backed up in reality. So if I am reporting.

(19:10):
In a mainstream media source. Exactly so.
One or two or three or. I rely on mainstream media a lot
for this. So if the Washington Post is on
the ground reporting something, I think that my standard is I'll
use the Washington Post reporting.
I'm not going to use a random person on the ground on Twitter
who is reporting this. You'll take a credited
journalist with the mainstream publication over a YouTube who's

(19:32):
on the ground and an independentjournalist on the ground in
Minneapolis. We trust both, but the
independent journalist on the ground in Minneapolis needs to
be backed up by some sort of credible information or source
like I You can't just go out there and start reporting things
without any sort of facts. Yeah.
What? What is a world without fact
checking? A world without fact checking.

(19:54):
I think that we are rapidly moving into a media environment
where AI is going to be so prevalent on the Internet, it's
going to be hard to Fact Check some of this in real time.
I'm sure everyone's family members has fallen for some sort
of AI video. And you're the one that has to
tell your mom or your grandma, hey, that cat didn't actually
save that other cat out of the lake or whatever, right?
So I think a media, that one didn't happen.

(20:16):
I think the media environment without fact checking.
Just turns into throwing mud at the wall and everybody trying to
push a completely dishonest narrative with no agreed upon
universe, not universal agreed upon truth that we can all at
least arrive at. Like we are now in a post
factual reality where we can't even agree on fundamental
things. Like did this person win this

(20:36):
election, is COVID real, is thisreal?
So it just really bothers me when I don't know people are in
high positions of power and spreading lies and aren't
getting fact checked. OK.
I want to go to how you both define yourselves because you
just said, Adam, you're not, youdon't consider yourself a
journalist. I I would characterize you, you
tell me. I mean, you're a content creator

(20:56):
who offers political commentary and analysis.
Is that fair? Yep.
I like to debate, I like to commentate over the news and I
yeah, I don't say I'm like an unbiased person on the ground
reporting the truth. I generally say I am just out
here to push my beliefs and makesure everybody.
How do you characterize your beliefs?

(21:16):
I am a center left liberal. I'm a I'm pretty moderate
compared to a lot of the party, but.
You don't identify with the Bernie, AOC Mom Donnie wing of
the party, although I think you like some of their.
I like them. Tactic, I mean, OK, so mom
Donnie is very very social mediasavvy, very good at social media
do. You considers have aligned with
the Democratic Socialist of America.
No, not at all. I mean, they probably have some

(21:37):
good ideas, maybe, but I am pretty much a liberal through
and through. I want to return to an America
where I can spread my liberal values of human dignity, of
equality, of all of this, without the government
overreaching right now. So yeah, just liberalism.
OK, Natalie, you define yourselfas a journalist.

(21:58):
You have a White House press pass as we all know.
But you have said you your assignment, right?
Your beat in a way is quote, covering the opposition forces
to Donald Trump. And you have said that we are
the enforcers of the MAGA agenda.
So, you know, take on your critics who would say that's
just communications for the administration.
That's not journalism. How do you define?

(22:20):
How do you define yourself? Certainly not at all.
I'd push back on that in two fronts.
First and foremost, I, I think I'm more of probably an
investigative reporter. Like I said, my roots are in
Chinese Communist Party infiltration.
That's my, my first love. It's what I enjoy doing.
But unfortunately, when they sent my boss, Stephen K Bannon
to prison, I had to take up the mantle of war room, host the
show. And through that, I did find

(22:42):
that I, I like hosting shows, doing more, you know, political
commentary type stuff. I think anybody who would say
that we are sycophants or, you know, regime puppets, but for
President Trump, I think has probably never watched about 5
minutes of war room. I think that war room strategy.
That's what you said though. That was your definition of
yourself. No, we we for MAG and that
that's important because I thinkwhat you're seeing is MAGA be

(23:05):
diluted in a way it's not being true to what President Trump ran
on. Whether you see that with mass
deportations and immigration, you see it with the trade deals,
you see it with the foreign policy.
OK, I actually want to get to that perception to the point,
but then so then just go to the point of how you define
yourself. So we hold them accountable to
what actually putting America first is.
And I think that the most important part of understanding

(23:26):
what we do is understanding whatAmerica first actually means,
which we can get into later. But that is I think first and
foremost where I view war rooms role in the White House media
landscape. And secondly, I also think sort
of related, I think the mass protest movements that you have
seen against the Trump administration, we liken it to a
color revolution framework. I think a lot of people who were

(23:49):
involved in sort of the regime change stuff in in foreign
countries, particularly in Eastern Europe, all the sort of
democracy scholars have really sort of used those tactics here
at home. It's why they depict President
Trump as an autocrat. It's why they depict him in
those sort of coded terms so they can use those similar
tactics. And we have always covered, I
think that the left wing protestmovement really followed the

(24:11):
funding, tried to understand what they're animated by
ideologically, what their drivers are.
And I think that's a unique thing about War Room.
So we're not running cover for the administration by covering
that. It's what our audience is just
actually interested in. I want to do just a little bit
more of just the the mechanics of how you both do what you do

(24:31):
your job. So that as I understand from
what you've both said, your job is to hold Republicans do
account, right? Or do I mean, you're, you're a
moderate liberal or left, but you're, you're sort of covering
the Trump administration and trying to hold it to account.
You in your own way are doing the same thing, but holding to
account by a different set of standards.
Is that fair? Is that fair?

(24:51):
You're both trying to hold the Trump administration from the.
Left from the right. Trying to hold there.
You go, we agree. 10 minutes. Thirty minutes.
What is is the most effective form of accountability?
I want both of you to answer that.
How do you hold your side accountable?
For us, it's through our audience.
I think the war room audience isboth loved and hated.

(25:11):
They're notorious for piling in,particularly on congressional
offices with phone calls. We've deposed a sitting speaker
of the House. We've killed multiple CRSI think
that's where we really. Derive Kevin McCarthy.
Yes, derive our power from it's,it's from our audience.
And I think the war Room audience is very unique.
And I think there's probably some overlap with your audience
where they're not a passive viewership, they are
hyperactive, they're the ones knocking doors, they're

(25:33):
donating, they are on the front lines and we are equipping them
to be on the front lines in the most effective way possible.
What is the most effective? I mean, are you going for a kind
of, I mean, she's actually goingfor a sort of mobilization of
individuals? What is that?
Is that your goal? I sent your goal is.
Twofold, I think I like to message for the Democratic
Party, not directly, but I want to push it in the direction that
I wanted to see we've we've lostmultiple.

(25:54):
Tell me, tell me more about thatvision.
OK. So is that Kevin Newsome?
Is that Rahm Emanuel? Is that?
Definitely not. Rahm Emanuel is.
It JB Pritzker. You know who I like lately is
Ossoff. Have you seen these clips going
around of John Ossoff The. Georgia Senator is.
Up for real? Yeah, he's pretty great.
But OK, like I said, the Democratic Party and young
people in this room can likely relate.

(26:14):
Has been too risk averse and twofinger waggy over and over.
We have candidates that are running that won't even go on
mainstream podcasts because they're a little bit too nervous
to misstep. Kamala Harris only had 107 days
to run her campaign, but she wasnot getting in these spaces that
she needed to get in. And my goal, she didn't.
Come on your podcast. She didn't come on my podcast.
She. Didn't go on yours either.
She didn't go on. She wasn't she.
Didn't go on Joe Rogan. She didn't go on any comedians

(26:35):
Podcast I. Think that's because Rogan
didn't take her. There's different reports, but
Trump would go on anyone's podcast as long as they had just
a tiny little microphone to stick in his face.
So what I want to do is essentially, literally, he would
go on any podcast. What I want to do is return to a
Democratic Party that is not so risk averse, that is more
authentic, and that can speak tothe average American without
always being so condescending. One of the ways I started doing

(26:57):
this is going to Trump rallies because I grew up in Indiana and
there were a lot of Trump rallies in Iowa during the
caucuses. And I realized that liberals
would go to these rallies and just be kind of condescending.
They would be kind of pricks if the Trump like, look how much
smarter I am than you. But I realized you should go
have a genuine conversation withyour fellow Americans and you
can reach a middle ground. So my entire thesis is that if

(27:17):
if we go out there on podcasts or in spaces like this or on CNN
and we just have our voice hearda common sense message that
Democrats don't want an open border.
Biden messed up on the border. We want a, a, an America where
people can come over here, buildtowards a better country.
And we want to make sure that the worst of the worst aren't
coming over here. Liberals need to have an
intuitive message that can get out there.

(27:39):
And we've just been lacking thatfor a while.
It feels like we've been hijacked by certain activist
wings that want to pull us to the left.
Or it seems like the right triesto paint us in some way and we
don't push back enough. So then we're the open border
party. We just need someone speaking to
the truth. OK, so, but on the policy, where
is that going to come down? Because there's a real tug of
war between the Mamdanis, not stylistically actually on the
substance of the policy between the AOC, Bernie Sanders, Zoran

(28:03):
Mamdani wing of the party and, and, and the sort of mainstream
Liberal Democrats, more moderateDemocrats.
Like, do Democrats need to take clear stances like abolishing
ICE, taxing the rich, implementing universal health
care, cutting ties with Israel? Like is that the direction the
party needs to go? I mean, those are clear stances,
but that's a very, very different vision than the

(28:24):
moderate Democratic stances that.
You I'm moderate, but I also think that populism can fit into
that talking to the average person from a moderate point of
view. So I don't want to tax all
billionaires out of existence. I'm not Bernie Sanders, but I
want to reform the tax code in such a way that the 150
loopholes for billionaires to beable to make a bunch of money
are maybe more rational. Maybe we tone down the loopholes
so the richest of the rich aren't getting these massive tax

(28:46):
breaks while the the working class people are getting cuts to
their Medicaid or their SNAP. And it's it's not like we want
to tax billionaires even more. It's not like I want to increase
the wealth tax. No, I just want to make sure
that it's a fair and equitable system.
So that can speak to a lot of Americans who feel screwed over
without me saying that I'm goingto tear down the entire system
like some far. Left.
You're not. You don't want to burn it all

(29:06):
down, no. Don't burn it all down.
Great. That's a win.
You alluded to a wedge on the right that I really I want to
ask you about because if you seeyour role as holding the Trump
administration accountable for the America First agenda in
November, President Trump had a really public falling out with

(29:30):
Marjorie Taylor Green, who criticized President Trump over
his handling of the Epstein files, foreign interventions,
failing to extend the AffordableCare Act subsidies.
And she said, quote, we campaigned and I went to
countless Trump rallies and stood on the stage with the
president and stood on the stagewith other Republican candidates
and said America first. No more regime change, no more

(29:54):
foreign wars, no more foreign intervention.
Enough of this. This is what America First
means. And ultimately, she said, you
know, I am America First, not MAGA.
She feels perhaps like you do ornot.
She feels that the Trump administration has abandoned
some of its America First policies.

(30:16):
Is she right? Well, I want to link your
question to what you said, and Irespect the direction that
you're trying to take your party, but I hate to break it to
you. The Democratic Party is the
party of open borders, but so isthe establishment Republican
wing of our party. I think that's sort of the
uncomfortable truth and that's sort of what MTG is getting AT.
And I think those are sort of the Republican Party forces.
I'm sorry, how is Marjorie Taylor Green getting at that?

(30:38):
That within the Republican Party, it's not like they have
all from day one been supportersof President Trump.
I'm not just talking about the Never Trump movement, but the
Republican Party. Much like the Democrat Party,
it's no secret they're run by their donors, they're run by
special interests. They like open borders, they
like cheap foreign labor. They like legal illegal
immigration because it's cheap labor and they like legal
immigration, especially Silicon Valley and all the tech giants

(31:01):
that have donated to President Trump.
They want the H1B caps to be as high as possible.
So those are the sort of, I think, foundational issues of
MAGA where we've been told from our Republican elite betters,
which I think share a lot in common with the Democrat Party
betters. I think you saw it in the 2013
autopsy, this idea that the way that Republican could win,
Republicans could win elections was to become softer and

(31:23):
moderate on immigration and to push, quote, comprehensive
immigration reform, which I think is about the scariest
phrase you can hear in all of Washington, DC.
And that is I think what you're seeing now, you're seeing people
try to push President Trump to soften on the mass deportations,
to increase caps on legal immigration like we're seeing.
And I think particularly you're seeing it happen sort of this
distortion and dilution of what putting America first means,

(31:46):
where even though you have the National Defense strategy, the
National Security strategy saying, hey, we're focusing on
America, somehow we seem to be we're.
Actually focusing on the Western.
Well, now, well, first and foremost our border and by
extension that it seems like we're somehow also getting
involved potentially in regime change in Iran, which I don't
support and I don't think MAGA supports Venezuela stuff.

(32:07):
We can maybe get into that. But I think that foreign policy
has always been first and foremost from the sort of
America first perspective about confronting the Chinese
Communist Party. And I think, I think you've seen
the administration go very soft on them.
I think I find that very concerning, so I don't.
Where have they gone soft on theChinese Communist?
Age 200 chips the fact that President Trump is going to be

(32:28):
going over there in meeting withthem, I think.
What about Tick tock? I mean, I think tick tock is
sort of a sideshow. I think it's a distraction
issue. Like we don't have transparency
into who's going to own the underlying, who's going to have
access to the underlying algorithms?
Is it going to be Byte Dance or,or is it only going to be the
American subsidiary? I mean, it'll probably be Byte,
believe me, I'm Tik Tok's numberone hater.

(32:50):
But I think when you're talking about critical infrastructure,
what's important? I care much more about rare
earths and critical minerals, which I think is a much more
important discussion that we need to be having and how China
owns it. And we can't even do trade deals
with them because they they own our choke points and supply
chains. I guess my question was, is
Marjorie Taylor Green right? I think it's it's too soon to
tell. And I think that to answer that

(33:11):
question definitively now is to imply that politics is stagnant
and it can't be in flux. Like there are issues where.
Basically onto something. I mean, it does sound like you
agree that that there's for people.
Who watch war but but I think where people maybe misunderstand
where maybe I would humbly and respectfully push back with with
what Marjorie Hiller Green is saying is that I think to just

(33:32):
capitulate and say it's over is is to give up when the Trump
administration has shown that they are receptive to the sort
of grassroots their base callingthem out.
And I think that people who justwant to throw in the towel.
That's not the American fightingspirit.
I don't think that that's what composes the people who make up
the war room audience. They're willing to make phone

(33:53):
calls. They're willing to get involved.
They're willing to call their members of Congress.
I hope you get them lighting up the phones about those aged 200
semiconductor chips that we gaveaway, that technology that we
gave away to the CCP. But I think that's important to
under. The way the Trump White House
gave away to the CCP. And I've been, I've, I've been a
critic of that since absolutely day one.
And that's why it's so funny when I get called for being a

(34:14):
Trump sycophant. We're probably harder on Trump,
honestly, in some ways than, than you are.
And confronting the Chinese Communist Party should be the
Trump administration's first andparamount priority.
And the fact that we're handing over technology to them that is
going to give them an advantage.And one of the, if not foremost,
the primary domains of where notjust economic warfare,
information warfare, but potentially kinetic warfare is

(34:34):
going to be fought. And we're allowing more Chinese
Communist Party students into American classrooms.
I don't agree with that. And I just.
Quite. I feel like we totally agree.
I agree as well. I think China is anatomy and I
think that Byte Dance probably should've known TikTok, so we
can agree on that. But I think when you say you're
putting America first, what I'm actually hearing is you're
trying to pull the Republican Party in a more radical
direction. Putting America first is

(34:55):
allowing. You can call it radical, she
would call it populist. Well.
Populist but not populist I. Care about borders?
Well, the majority of Americans think that legal immigration is
something that is OK because it benefits the United States.
Republicans view immigrants in afundamental, a different way
than they view everybody else. You guys view immigrants as net
drains on the society, but that is not borne out.
You can look at anybody as a drain on the society.

(35:17):
I take up housing, you take up electricity, you take up space
on the road. So when you say that immigrants
take up housing and immigrants take up electricity, it's sort
of my myopic view. And they take up jobs or because
they create. Immigrants also create a lot for
this country, whether it comes to housing, whether it comes to
building stuff for this country.I mean, immigrants are net
taxpayers. For personal anecdote, my
grandpa moved here from Syria inthe late 90s, and you could

(35:41):
argue, yeah, he was taking up space.
Why was this person from Syria taking up space in the United
States? We shouldn't have let him here.
But my grandpa has built a business that now employs dozens
of people, that feeds dozens of families.
My grandpa owns a business with thousands of clients that he
helps with insurance. He helps make their lives
better. I grew up in Indiana, where my
community was full of a lot of Muslims who became heart doctors

(36:01):
or surgeons or very productive memories of society.
You want to talk about welfare? How about the fact that 30% of
working physicians in this country are immigrants Are
people who are coming here to help Americans?
That is putting America first. How are physicians that are
immigrants helping Americans, not putting America first?
We should don't take that, Don'ttake that, don't take that.
I'm gonna ask a question. But what I would like you to
respond to is, is there a positive story about immigrants

(36:25):
who aspire to live the American dream that are living in a way
that isn't undermining the American experience for
Americans already here? Is that, I mean, do you
subscribe to that notion in any way or do you reject it?
Of course there are some, but the way that you're seeing legal
immigration happen now is just historically, empirically
extremely different from the waves that you saw before.
You used to have an on period ofpeople coming in and an off

(36:47):
period, and the people who wouldcome in would assimilate, much
like your grandfather. They would actually, I think,
enjoy American culture because you had to.
Now, I think you have this sort of weird perverse left wing
ideology where we're told that assimilation is racist.
And I don't think that that works.
I think you see a lot of kind ofethnic cleavages and fighting.
That's the political science, just the term of it, which

(37:09):
historically it's borne out likethat in every other country
ever. And I think when you talk about
the immigration issue, it's likewe have to do this performative
to some extent ritual where we have to praise immigrants as
like the greatest thing that hasever happened to this country.
I'm not bashing or nagging all immigrants, but I also think we
can appreciate the contributionsthat Americans have made to this
country. And I think that if you want to

(37:30):
understand my audience and whereyou would call this a radical
idea comes from, it comes from what you saw happen.
And for example, Minnesota with Somalian fraud, where you see,
you know, us out of the kindnessand goodness of the American
people's heart, opening our doors to a refugee community
that really has nothing in common with American culture.
And what do you get in return? People who create their own sort

(37:50):
of, I mean, it's territory there.
They've effectively like seceded.
They don't speak the language. A lot of them, most of them are
on some form of welfare. You can Fact Check me.
I like that Fact Check because Iknow I'm right.
But more importantly, they set up these scammy organizations
where they're taking federal grant money and then you try to
investigate them and you're called racist for wondering
where your tax dollars are going.

(38:11):
The American people have been abused by the legal immigration
system. And sure, are there some
immigrants that are good? Yes.
But there's also a lot of problems with our immigration
system. It's a problem of scale.
It's too many people. It feels like if the problem
with our immigration system is like a tumor in my calf, your
solution is to cut off the entire left half of my body.
You want no immigration into theUnited States, right?

(38:32):
Is that fair to say? Well.
I mean, you get to a moratorium for a few years and I think the
American people are strong and smart enough that we'd.
Manage. How about we can agree on one
thing. I agree that assimilation is
good when it comes to Minneapolis.
The the ringleader of that fraudwas a white woman named Amy
Block. But I agree that overall
assimilation is good. When immigrants come to the
United States, they should come here legally.
They should love our country. They should be paying taxes to

(38:54):
our country. And they should try to ideally
speak English. They should speak our language.
Is that anything you disagree with?
Or I mean, assimilation is good.I don't like the idea that all
people on the left think assimilation is racist.
I think that immigrants should come here, make our country
better, assimilate and be a partof America.
Yes, but I also think you have to look at this contextually.
I mean, we've got young Americans in the audience.

(39:15):
They're going to be competing for jobs against whether it's
immigrants, foreign born workers, the H1B visas, this
whole issue of legal immigration.
I think that every student, especially at a Community
College, should be an American citizen.
I don't think we should have anyforeigners.
I don't think we should have anyillegal aliens, any dreamers,
whatever term they've come up with.
And I all I'm saying is that American citizens, American born

(39:36):
citizens should be given priority for jobs to live a life
where they can actually make a living wage, where they don't
have to go on some form of welfare because their wages have
been so depressed, because we'reseeing such a mass inundation
and overflow of cheap foreign labour.
I think we both care about the working class, but it's
indisputable is under Obama's own National Economic Council

(39:59):
where they put out study after study showing.
But it's illegal immigration that is the mass depression of
wages, particularly for minorityAmericans.
So I know I'm called a racist all the time, but it's actually
those people who are having a worse off quality of life
because of the flooding of cheapimmigrant labor, so I care.
I mean, that's somewhat disputedin your hometown of LA.
Much of the damage from the fires can't be rebuilt because

(40:21):
there's no labor source to rebuild the houses and the
Palisades. So, yeah, I mean, there is like
an undersupply of Labor that used to used to be met by,
frankly, undocumented workers who would come into California
to help build things. Right.
And so I'm that's, that's like, I mean, that that's where his
side would argue for some kind of immigration reform.
Because the wages became so depressed and because actual

(40:44):
blue collar jobs. Is important.
That Americans couldn't have. There's been study after study
of immigration's effect on wagesand it's never said that
immigrant that wages are suppressed.
How can? Dumping infinite amounts of more
people into any closed country lead to wage increases for
native born American. Hold on economic this is this.
Becomes an economic debate wherewe should have actual economies

(41:06):
and national. OK, you can ask a question, but
first I'm going to show you guysa clip of William F Buckley
Junior. Have you ever heard of him?
OK, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
It's just that you guys are so young and articulate, and it's
making me feel old. OK.
So William Buckley Junior hosteda program called Firing Line for
33 years. In 1979, he actually tackled the
question of immigration. How many people should be

(41:29):
allowed in and from where? Listen to what he says in this
exchange with the first Latino commissioner of the Immigration
and Nationalization Service. Take a look.
Well, is, is the question purelyA numerical question or is it
one that has also to do with ethnic balance?

(41:49):
I think it has to do with with the whole vision of the country.
If my memory is correct, it was only about 13 or 14 years ago
that we officially renounced thepreference that had previously
been written into the law for two groups #1 Western Europeans
#2 resident of this hemisphere. Is that correct?

(42:11):
Yeah, we've we've gradually moved toward a non racial type
policy. OK, so he's saying we have
gradually in our immigration policy moved towards a non
racial policy. There is a sense that sort of
implicitly, we are moving towards a racial policy for

(42:31):
immigration under this administration.
There, there's this the the criticism is that the Trump
administration wants a whiter America.
Is that fair? I think that's absolutely
absurd. The idea of populism, economic
nationalism, is maximizing the value of what it means to be an
American citizen. I don't care what race you are.

(42:53):
I don't care what your religion is.
I don't care what your ethnicityis.
I don't care about any of that. I care that first and foremost,
first and foremost, you are an American citizen.
And I don't think that the government should be actively
getting involved, trying to sabotage your life.
Weird perverse version of the social contract whereby you see
them creating economic, economicpolicies where, yes, inundating
this country with cheap foreign labor depresses wages for

(43:16):
Americans. I don't think there's any racial
component. I mean, they've barely failed or
they've barely, barely managed to deport more people than their
Democratic predecessors. So I don't really understand how
you could find any racial anything lens to look at their
immigration policy. And by the way, I also don't
think that you can fundamentallydistinguish or differentiate

(43:36):
their immigration policy from their trade policy.
Those are two sides of the same coin, particularly this,
particularly this idea of putting the American worker 1st.
And I think to look at the Trumpimmigration policy through a
racial lens is just a not borne out in the statistics.
But you're missing the forest for the trees.
The American people, my war audience, they don't care about
immigration because of race. They care about it because of

(43:58):
American identity, of which we are all Americans, I assume in
here, and that the idea that ourgovernment should not be making
our lives more difficult. Adam, do you want to?
I disagree entirely. This administration is
absolutely looking at immigration through a racial
lens. You can look at the temporary
protected status they have removed from many groups, all

(44:19):
minority groups. You can look at the refugee
status they are allowing from South Africa.
They are banning countries from coming in or people from
countries that are black or thatlook a certain way.
But white refugees are the only ones that are being allowed to
come in. Stephen Miller's guidance.
Stephen Miller's guidance of this immigration policy is
absolutely racial. The way that he speaks about
immigration in apocalyptic manner as if our country is

(44:42):
being overrun. I just, I absolutely think you
can look at not only the numbers, but the actions of the
Trump administration. Then they do a Muslim ban during
their first term very intentionally.
Then they call it a Muslim ban too.
They said that they. Said countries that Obama
selected but. Can I ask you, did you say
earlier that you don't want any colleges in the United States to
have any immigrants? No, I was saying a community

(45:02):
colleges should only be for American citizens.
I don't think we should have anyChinese nationals on campus.
I think that's a national security threat.
And I don't think that we shouldbe training the next generation
of essentially PLA combatants that will either be going up
against whether through economicwarfare, information warfare or
potentially kinetic, especially when you look at the military
civil fusion that they have going on over there and how they

(45:22):
routinely steal documents and engage in IP.
That is very fair and narrow point of view.
You said I don't want our community colleges to have these
people, but it just feels like you then have this really broad
swath immigration perspective where So are you OK with people
who are coming here and are paying taxes and are
contributing to the country? Are you OK with that?
Are you OK with legal immigration in that manner?
That's such a vague question it Do I want the whole world

(45:46):
legally immigrating here? No, not.
The whole world that's. Not what I'd ask, do I want, you
know, enough for it's a net boonto the economy?
Sure. But to ask me if I support that,
I think is sort of a vague and superfluous and really not
getting anywhere questioned because the debate is about how
many people we should have. And my point is we have too
much. It's making American culture
into a Third World derivative ofitself, and it's hurting the

(46:07):
wages of American workers. Yeah, when people say the third
row derivative of itself is racist, like how do you how do
you what do you mean by that? When you.
Say I don't want to live in Somalia, I want to live in
America. And when you import people in
such a high rate of number of people and they all gather in
the same community, you turn those states.

(46:28):
You turn those communities and to by the way, the countries,
the war-torn countries and cut some cases, I can't even call
them a country because they're afailed state that they left and
they shouldn't be importing those policies.
I want to live in America. The beauty of America is that we
can all come together. But if we're lying about what
coming together looks like, thenI can't sit here and say I want
to live in Somalia and say that Somalia is the same as America

(46:48):
because it's not. Or these people wouldn't be
fleeing Somalia and going to Minnesota.
And maybe that's an uncomfortable or racist thing to
say. It's not.
It's true. I don't, I'm not going to call
you racist. I don't think that's fair.
That's not what I'm going for. But I just think that the idea
your your depiction of not only Minneapolis, but parts of the
United States is nearing a thirdworld country.
It feels like the natural conclusion of that is an

(47:11):
immigration policy that restricts people from certain
countries that are going to turnour country into a quote UN
quote, third world country like I.
Think you are arguing for a restrictionist position at
least, at least for, I mean, that's not a surprise, right?
At least for an intermediary period.
Because you think for too long we have had too many people come
in and there hasn't been assimilation, which is, is fair
characterization. I, I think it's, it's the, the

(47:32):
choice of words that triggers people and makes it sound like
you're saying we don't want black people or as I mean, it
just it resonates and triggers. I know well.
I don't want to let put it this way, I want to live in a
country, not a failed state. When I think of the third world,
I think of gross infrastructure,which I guess maybe we have
here. I think of corrupt governments,
which we occasionally have here.And I, I just think of, I mean,

(47:55):
I don't think I have to explain what the third world is to you
guys. I don't want to live there.
I want to live in an advanced country and society where
there's shared values and where we all speak English.
We have to get to student questions.
Who's going first, Grace? Grace Murlak, who is a senior
here at Hofstra University. Grace, what's your question?
Hi, thank you guys so much for having me today.

(48:15):
So you've mentioned today we're seeing an increase of artificial
intelligence on short, short form digital platforms.
With this rise of AI producing incorrect information, how do
you suggest that we ensure the information we consume from
these non traditional media sources such as Instagram and
TikTok are properly vetted for correct information?
That's the big question. There's a few different ways you

(48:37):
can approach it, either media literacy skills from a younger
age where people as they grow upare shown certain aspects of
lies online in a very perceptiveways.
We we want young people to be able to perceive what is a lie
online and what is not. So there's that you can do media
literacy. You can also take like a top
down approach where the companies themselves decide to

(48:59):
put some sort sort of flag on something, which I think
Instagram does that sometimes like warning, this is an AI
generated image. So there's a few different ways
you can push it. I personally think that AI is
not going away. It's something that we have to
keep on iterating and improving so we can compete with China, of
course. So it's just how can we make
sure it doesn't devolve our society into just straight slop

(49:20):
and lies? Natalie, I know that your
experience, especially in high school as you've described, was
saturated with deep biases that you had to work your way
through, He says media literacy.But what about illiteracy about
the information that you're getting and the biases that are
presented within that information?
How do you tackle that? If you're getting all of your
information from, as she said, you know, Instagram, TikTok, all

(49:44):
these sort of digital sources, How do you, how do you begin to
sift through and identify the biases that are implicitly that
are sort of hidden in the message that you're being
delivered? I feel like there's always this
kind of urge, there's this idea that you need to outsource to
other people or you can learn from other people.
Like how do I understand the bias of this source?
I think it's just about doing the research for yourself.

(50:06):
I know that's like maybe a cope answer.
That's a lot of work. Not everyone can do that.
Well, you should, I mean. Ideally, that's fair.
I mean. I we shouldn't fall for AI
either, but people do. Yeah, but I I mean, I just what?
You're saying is what you're saying is do the work.
I'm just saying, like, I think sometimes people like to take
the worst interpretation or justhave no trust in like the

(50:29):
brilliance and intelligence of mankind.
And OK, maybe you fall for like a cat video occasionally.
I don't really think that that'swhat we're talking about.
I think we all have got instincts that we can trust when
we read this stuff. I'm not saying that.
Country City's an expert, though.
Like, not everybody can, like, go deep in the Chinese Communist
Party's translated papers. I don't think people are as as

(50:51):
it's not. I don't use the word dumb, but
as dumb as this narrative is where it's like you need to go
to some media literacy expert and learn how you can better
engage with media bias. No, I mean you said.
You I don't think that it's thatmuch of of a problem.
Here's the thing. But you talk about having gone
to a bake sale in high school that was for equal salaries,
like equal pay for men and women, right?
And, and like, it was, but it was, it was taken for granted

(51:13):
that men and women were paid differently.
And you felt like intrinsically that was ridiculous because you
had somehow informed yourself, but nobody else had.
Nobody else had developed a different perspective on that.
So you already have distinguished yourself by going
deep on research and developing an opinion that is, you know,
counter counterintuitive but fact based based on the research
that you had done about the salaries of men and women.

(51:37):
OK, that's not normal. This is a breaking don't do that
right? Like most people don't do that
right. So I do think that there is like
there is a degree of trying to figure out if what you're being
told is true. Like how are people supposed to
go about I? Just, I just think it's a, it's
a tricky thing, these kind of nebulous terms of instructing

(51:59):
media literacy, like who is creating that curriculum?
Who is creating the idea of whatit means to be literate in
media? Because all three of us,
everyone in the audience would have a different interpret,
different interpretation of whatthat means.
And I think when you outsource that such critical kind of
thinking that in flex and shapesyour whole being to like one

(52:20):
other person. So you're saying do the work?
Your answer is do the work yourself.
I think. The work.
What we're missing here is not everyone is just happening to
stumble upon a cat video online or some AI video online.
We have nefarious actors in positions of power who are
trying to use AI to persuade themasses of things that aren't
true. I remember a few months before
the 2024 election, Elon Musk to go back to him.

(52:41):
He owned the platform of X. Just think about how crazy this
is. He used his wealth to get Trump
elected, to donate a bunch to Trump.
He bought X for about $44 billion.
At the time it was Twitter. And then he used the platform of
X to post an AI advertisement ofKamala Harris's voice.
But it wasn't her voice. It was a fake Kamala Harris
saying I want to open the borderand I want communism for
everybody. I want transgender for

(53:02):
everybody. This is Elon Musk.
You know how many views it got? I believe it was like 20 +
1,000,000, maybe even 50 + 1,000,000.
Just so many views, so much narrative control coming from
one person who is using AI to manipulate the media
environment. I told my friends a few years
ago, I bet you in 2032 we're going to have AI influencing
elections. But little did I know the
president of the United States was more than comfortable.

(53:25):
I guess Trump was running at thetime.
Trump was more than comfortable leveraging AI to trick people.
Trump quite literally posts random AI videos and AI slop all
of the time on his truth. Socially, you can see it
wherever. So when we have the president
pushing AI, I don't think it's too crazy to say that, you know,
there should be some sort of standards of literacy and it
shouldn't be one person. I don't think like Bill Gates

(53:45):
should be they're deciding what media literacy the.
Truth is, there's a regulatory regime that has not caught up
with any of these new technologies and also a
legislative like a series of laws.
You can have curriculum. Of course, fundamentally behind,
I mean, we're, of course, as youguys know, we're legislating
around the Internet with a telecommunications act from the
1990s. Let's go to our next question,

(54:06):
Olivia Anstadt, Freshman Political Science major.
Thank you for having me. So I think we can all agree that
social media is inherently biased towards extremists and
very like controversial people, seeing as their content invokes
emotion and that and therefore they attract a much larger
audience. And that being said, how do we

(54:28):
now, as a society, recenter our popular media around truth,
diversity and good intent in this age that is so fueled by
bias and prejudice? OK, that's a lot.
No. No, that's a good question.
That's a really good question. I don't have the exact answer.
I mean, that's a really good question, but I, I know exactly
what you were talking about. The algorithms currently

(54:49):
incentivize and promote the mostoutrageous content.
That's why on Twitter or Instagram, you'll see people
like Nick Fuentes on the far right going viral.
You'll see Elon Musk going viralfor saying something very
divisive. And then often times as the
counterweight to that, you don'thave like a moderate liberal
going viral. Generally, it's somebody on the
far left going viral for their extremist views.

(55:09):
Two, I think this gives us a warped perception of each other
and I think it quite frankly allows extremists to control the
meat, the the media message and it elects extremists.
We we are currently living in anenvironment where the social
media incentivization of radicalization is beginning to
translate into our electeds being more radical because

(55:29):
they're using social media, therefore they're giving more
and more radical takes and they're elected.
Well, it certainly clicks are asthe more radical people are, you
incentivize more clicks. You've got more attention.
Certainly just take apart the Trump part from that.
Let me just ask you like I want to take apart that thing rather
than just responding him. My question for you is, do you,
what do you think about the algorithms and their ability to

(55:53):
potentially throttle or incentivize sort of help certain
actors? Well I think you got to
differentiate it between pre Elon purchasing Twitter and
Post. And I think that a lot of this
stuff started in twenty, 17/20/2017 after President Trump

(56:14):
won, where you saw a lot of the elites, the Republican and
Democrat, it's no secret that the Republican establishment did
not want him to win. I think start to be very fearful
of free speech on the Internet. They viewed that as a net
negative. And when you go overseas to
Europe, they saw Brexit happening and the kind of

(56:34):
European partners were like Brexit, Germany exit all these
European countries. We could see a similar thing
start to happen. And after that, that was the
advent of what we call the censorship industrial complex,
where you saw the propping up, Imean, almost overnight of this
whole entire grant making industry to universities, to

(56:54):
NGOs, to the sort of idea of media literacy where they were
funding studies not just to censor misinformation, but these
very radical ideas of pre bunking and debunking
misinformation around topics that we all in this room would
not agree on are actually misinformation.
And that stuff was leveraged to,I don't know, censor the sitting
president of the United States and RIP him off of like every

(57:15):
social media network ever, even probably Ubereat.
It's so that was the culmination.
Well, that's but this is this isthe point, because the
censorship is not actually of falsehoods.
It's censorship of ideas that threaten the power of the
current ruling elite, the regime.
Whether or not they think their their ideas are true or not, it

(57:37):
doesn't matter. They use censorship as a tool of
political power, just like you feel like censorship is used as
a tool of political power against you.
I'd push back on that saying that the algorithm of X is now
open source. It was never like that before.
The Twitter file showed that that censorship only went one
way. But censorship historically, I
think we're all, we're at a university, we know that has
been used to silence critics of the regime.

(58:00):
And that's what you saw happen at the start of 2017?
Yeah. My question was really about not
just the algorithm of Twitter, but just algorithms generally,
and whether there you think there's some sort of something
to this notion that the algorithms for their own
purposes, probably bottom line purposes, are making us more
extreme and dividing us more intentional.
I think I think that's misattributing the blame.

(58:20):
I don't think it's the platformsthat are making us more extreme.
I think it's the lived economic experience of Americans that is
driving them to left and right wing populism.
I don't think it's it's XI think.
Gives me a combination. I think that people's lived
experiences are making them lookfor answers.
They want a change agent in politics.
That's why Kamala frankly lost for a lot reasons, of course,
but one of the many reasons, oneof the many reasons she wasn't

(58:42):
seen as a change agent, whereas Trump was a change agent.
He was going to change the system.
So people's lived experiences make them disillusioned.
Then they go on social media andthey're like, do I choose
between AOC or do I choose between like Marjorie Taylor
Green? And they have these positions
that, you know, might be outsideof the moderates.
OK, Morgan Mighty class of 2027,what is your question?
Thank you. So I want to ask, how should

(59:04):
digital influencers be held accountable or allow to continue
sharing space in political spheres, given that they often
fail to disclose biases while their content also operates
within social media algorithms that subtly recommend content
that potentially sway users toward particular political

(59:24):
affiliations or trains of thought without their knowledge.
It's hard. That's the problem with digital
media is that it's decentralizedin such a way, or as I was
talking about earlier, when you're working in mainstream
media, there's all these confirmation process.
You have to go through hoops that you have to jump through to
even post one article. In digital media, anybody can

(59:45):
post anything with any lies at any moment, and it can be
boosted in the algorithm. So how do you hold people like
that accountable? I guess through tension with
people who disagree with them. Like for example, if I see
someone spreading BS in my Twitter algorithm, I quote,
tweet them and I make sure that I push back and hold them
accountable. There's really not a good way
right now on social media platforms other than I guess
reporting people trying to turn people's audience against them.

(01:00:07):
I I see it all the time, people spewing so much disinformation
and it only grows their audiencefinger. .8 million subscribers,
How do you have time to go through every single comment in
fact? No, it's about targeting people.
Yesterday during the Super Bowl,Jake Paul tweeted something
about Rico and how Bad Bunny is a fake U.S. citizen.
So I quote tweeted him and I went quite viral for doing this.
I got a few million views. I said you literally bought a

(01:00:28):
house in Puerto Rico. You literally moved there so you
don't have to pay taxes. And I posted a photo of him
flying around the Puerto Rican flag.
So it's like you are quite literally a hypocrite.
And this almost got his tweet, got about 11 million views.
Mine got about four. So it's not like I'm directly
holding him accountable. But that is tension there.
That gives the opposite point ofview.
Now when there's someone on my side who's spewing BS, it's a

(01:00:49):
little bit different. I call them out from a different
angle. Sometimes it's harder.
You got to walk a tightrope. We need more accountability
online. I totally think so, yeah.
How do you, I mean, when it comes to, I've heard you talk
about sort of your POV and bias and you're very clear that you
have a point of view, you have your own bias and your your
position is it's your responsibility to reveal that

(01:01:10):
bias and the audience then gets to decide what to do with that.
Is that a fair characterization of how you would take on that
question? 100% I mean, I don't think I'm,
I'm unique. I think everybody has the bias,
right? And I think that that bias can
be shown in ways honestly, beyond just the actual coverage
of stories. It's the issues that people
choose to cover or not to cover,right?
I, I think this idea of holding people accountable and like

(01:01:33):
always having to outsource what you have within yourself to do.
You know how you hold people accountable If they're lying,
don't consume or share their stuff.
Don't reward them for their lying.
That's my my point. You don't have to feed the
beast. Yeah, so don't you have power as
an individual and you don't always have to like outsource it
to some other entity to hold people accountable.

(01:01:54):
You can hold people accountable by not giving them the
impression. Brian Kennedy, Class of 2027,
what is your question? Yes, thank you very much for
having me. I feel like my question is a
little more relevant as we've discussed artificial
intelligence. So while connectedness with
others serves many benefits, thedilution of tragedies is a very
big fear that I have an online landscape, particularly whether

(01:02:16):
it's taken as just another passing news story, a happening
sell merchandise, or something relegated to sort of like the
realm of memes and jokes. In a world where first hand
videos of war, famine and atrocities are common across
platforms and social media stories, how can politicians and
officials make sure our nation'syouth talking, especially Gen.
Z and Gen. Alpha, anyone afterwards or

(01:02:38):
before, but especially our youth, does not become
desensitized to such events or too inclined to follow the
narrative someone is posing? Yeah, this is a very real
problem. For all of human history, we
have not had access to a magic box in our hand that could give
us an insight into anything that's going around across the
globe, whether it's in the Middle East or whether it's in
Europe. Gen.

(01:02:58):
Z ers are inundated constantly with a lot of really, really
wild imagery in videos. And now when there's a war
breaking out or when there's a plane crash, you can see videos
like inside the plane. I don't know exactly how humans
are meant to react to this. I think that yes, there is a
desensitization happening, especially within our politics

(01:03:19):
of radicalization. Something that I really worry
about, and I'm going to take it to Trump for one moment, is that
his insane posts are honestly just not breaking through to the
average person. Less than a week ago, our
current president posted a videoof our former president and
tried to depict him as a gorillain the jungle, right?
And his wife as a gorilla in thejungle.
I asked my friend about this whovoted for Trump, and I was like,

(01:03:40):
isn't this messed up? He didn't see it, he didn't hear
about it. He probably will never look.
Into To be fair, they took it down very.
Quickly, not very quickly. They took it down after Caroline
Levitt lied about it, and then they took it down after like 13
hours. So they took it down way too way
way after. They should have either way.
Actually thought it was quicker.Than that it was it was a while
it was on over, it was up overnight.
There is a desensitization to radicalization in the top tiers

(01:04:02):
of our politics. There is a desensitization to
violence online. I think this is a real problem
and I don't know what to say. A lot of these questions I'm
saying I don't have the answer to because these are just really
broad, broad questions about it's.
A brave new world, and we're trying to figure it out.
Yeah, if I had all the answers Iwould probably be.
You'd have 1.8 trillion trillionsubscribers.
I'd be advising the next Democratic campaign or

(01:04:24):
something, but I'm out. Here you may still be.
We're coming up on the 250th anniversary of this country.
I think it's fair for this moment to prompt a degree of
reflection about the values thatthis country holds, the values
we aspire to, the ideals that that are in the declaration that
have not yet been achieved, but that we are.

(01:04:45):
I mean, this is the idea of an ideal.
We're we're constantly aspiring to achieve it.
And I think there's like this, this question about what is it
going to mean to be an American into the next century.
So I just want to put that question to both of you, like,
what does it mean to be an American as we approach our
250th anniversary? You take it first, Natalie.

(01:05:07):
I think it means to understand and appreciate our founding for
what it was, how just amazing and unique and novel and in a
time period where the ideas thatthey were advancing, we're so
radical, but how we have just come to feel them as a second
nature. I think that is what it means to
be an American. I think I certainly want to go

(01:05:28):
and reread some of our founding documents.
I think there's something you kind of living in DC, it's fun
to go to the archives every now and then and just read the
Constitution, read the Declaration, you know, that kind
of stuff. And I think people have lost
touch with how just truly awe inspiring, and I mean divine our
founding was. And I think that may be the best

(01:05:49):
way in light of our discussion. When you talk about
assimilation, immigration, what it means to be an American, how
you conceive of what the government should be interacting
with you, your life, your livelihood.
If you go back to those foundingdocuments and the rich, raw and
vigorous debate that they had, Ithink you can find answers to a
lot of questions that we're having now.

(01:06:11):
Not just textually, but the spirit of I believe in
something, you believe in something, you believe in
something, My audience believes in something.
That's why they make their phonecalls.
It's worth fighting for. We probably should have won the
Revolutionary War, but somehow, by the grace of God, we did.
And I think that's what it's about.
I agree with a lot of that. I think that the founding of
this country was amazing. Of course it's it's amazing.

(01:06:33):
Genuinely, I think the debates that you can read at some of the
conventions are very, very interesting.
Of course, when I think of American values in a present day
setting, I think of things like democracy or human dignity or a
peaceful transfer of power or strength and decency on the
global stage. I view America as a leader, a a
leader of things on the global stage.

(01:06:54):
My fear is a lot of that is being stripped away.
When we talk about the peaceful transfer of power that's been
thwarted by one president while he was sitting and it was Donald
Trump who stopped the peaceful transfer of power for 11 hours.
While people are chanting, hang Mike Pence, we can talk about
democracy or free and fair elections.
I think Trump stample or tramples all over that.
When I think of decency on the global stage or treating our

(01:07:15):
allies with respect, Trump tramples all over that.
He wrote a letter to the Prime Minister of Norway saying hey,
why didn't I get this Nobel Peace Prize?
It was like an angry rage filledletter about a Nobel Peace Prize
to an ally. So when I think of American
values, I think of decency, democracy, peaceful transfer of
power. I don't see those being
represented by our leadership right now.
All. Right, Adam Mockler, not other.

(01:07:36):
Thank you for joining me on Firing Line and best of luck to
you as we watch your careers moving forward.
Thank you. Thank you.