Batya Ungar-Sargon UNLEASHED: Media Elites, The Fractured Right, & the Anti-Semitism Panic

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to another episode of the Chicks on the Right podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
You guys, this has.

Speaker 3 (00:05):
Been a long time coming.

Speaker 1 (00:07):
We are so excited to have is our guest today,
bay Ya Angar Sargan.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
If you watch our show, you.

Speaker 3 (00:13):
Know what huge fans we are.

Speaker 1 (00:15):
You know how often we use her clips. So we've
got her here in person now. She is a journalist
and an author and now host of her very own
show on News Nation at four pm Eastern on Saturdays.

Speaker 3 (00:27):
So we will talk about.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
News of the day.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
Obviously we'll get to some you know, narco terrorists and whatnot,
But first we wanted to just hear a little bit
about your background. We know you were born here in
the United States, but you attended high school in Israel.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
So how did that happen.

Speaker 1 (00:40):
And how did you end up being on this career path.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me.
I love the show. I think you guys bring the
exact right tone to a lot of the ninkham poopery,
shall we say, cops on the Right, which is you
just laugh at it, which is exact exactly what is needed.
I'm sure we'll get into this, but I think the
like taking it too seriously is a big part of

(01:05):
the problem. I just love you, guys. I love this show.
It makes me feel so warm and happy and even
to laugh at myself sometimes. So anyway, thank you so
much for having me. We're so happy that you are
doing for our nation. Yeah. I was born here and
my parents were Orthodox Jews, and they decided that that

(01:29):
we were living in Boston at the time, and they
were very worried that the school was not religious enough,
and so we moved to Israel and I went to
high school there and it was a really intense experience.
But the thing that I remember the most is when
I got back here for college, I just felt this
immense sense of relief. And it took me a long
time to understand what that was. And it was just

(01:51):
like I'm an American and I was home, and like,
I feel very strongly like that this is like this
land is my homeland. And I think that Jews felt
that way who lived here. I mean, there were Jews
in America since sixteen fifty four, and they really felt
that this was the Promised Land. And that's how I
feel about it. And I think I can remember that,

(02:13):
like I went to college and I was like, why
do I feel so buoyant all the time? And you know,
at the time, I wouldn't have had the language to
say it's probably the First Amendment, but that stuff is
spiritual for us as Americans, I think. And how did
I become a journalist? Was? I was? I wanted to

(02:33):
become a journalist, but you have to take a lot
of unpaid internships in order to do that. It's why
our journalism sucks right now, which is what first book
was about, because like only rich kids basically become journalists,
rich leftists, who are you know type? So basically I
was like, I can't do that, you know. So I
basically went back to school. I got my PhD. And

(02:55):
while I was writing my PhD thesis, I moved to
New York I had been living, and I got at Berkeley.
I was living in northern California. As you can imagine,
I was not very popular there.

Speaker 2 (03:05):
Oh my gosh, Berkeley. Wow. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:08):
I wasn't like conservative at the time. But it was
just like the like the obvious, like ridiculousness of the
politics of my peers. Like I was pretty apolitical at
the time, but like just if you just would say,
like wait, why do you think that it was like
you would get like immediately like so I didn't like
really fit in there. So I moved to New York

(03:28):
to finish writing my thesis. And at that point I
moved my husband. I moved in together, and he's Ukrainian Jewish.
They stay near their mamas. His mom lived, so we
moved to Sheepshid Babie to South Brooklyn and it was
literally a month later that Hurricane Sandy happened. It was
this like massive, massive hurricane. It was wild, you guys.

(03:52):
Like we lived on the third floor of a Victorian
in the attic and you would look out the window
and basically this five foot wave just came down the street.
All the cars and their alarms would go off, but
you couldn't hear anything because they were underwater, so you
would just see the lights blinking under this massive wave.
It was like it was wild.

Speaker 4 (04:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
Basically what happened was there was in Brighton Beach there
was a huge community of undocumented immigrants living in basement apartments,
illegal like conversions, and they all they lost everything because
the basement apartments just got completely like wiped out. And
the landlords of course were like while these people aren't documented,
we don't have to give them back their security deposits.

(04:34):
They it was horrible. It was really sad. They were
living in the church. So I kept waiting for somebody
to like write an article about this, because I'd like
walk around the neighborhood to talk to people, and like,
no one was writing about it, no one was writing
about it. Finally, a friend of mine set, well, why
don't you write about it? And I was like, Poshaw,
I don't know how to do that. I'm I write
long sentences that nobody can understand. I don't know how

(04:57):
to do that. He's like, well, do together, and we
did and it was so like immediately I was like, oh,
of course I'm supposed to be doing this. And it
was a struggle because I was I literally, you guys,
so I'm this is twenty twelve. I was thirty or
some of the thirty one. I don't remember how exactly
how old I was, but I literally would have interviews

(05:17):
and people would say you're too old, like these are
jobs for people in their twenties.

Speaker 4 (05:22):
Oh my god, yeah, and it's like it really, like
you really think, like is that true?

Speaker 3 (05:28):
Like when somebody who's high up in an industry tells
you something like that, You don't. I was just like,
there's no way that's true. Yeah wow, But it's really
it's a very punishing industry. The people in it suck.
Chris Arnatti, do you guys know that guy? He wrote
this amazing book called Dignity. He was on the whole
like the left has sold out the working class like

(05:50):
way before I was. But he's worked in a lot
of different industries, like five or six different industries. He
always says, like the journals are the worst, Like they're
the worst. They're just so petty and van glorious. They're
over credentialed. Most of them come from wealthy families. They
have immense, immense like guilt and white shame and guilt
about it, like you would die if you knew how

(06:12):
rich they were. So they do all right, the weird
stuff to hide it like they're horrible. So but all
of them just to say yeah, eventually you know, years
later here I am.

Speaker 4 (06:22):
Oh my gosh, and they had they're the ones. They're
the ones you have like initially lost so much touch
with the working class and now that's that's our party,
don't you think they're Republicans. Like the left always said, Hey,
we're the ones who are in touch with the working class.
We love you know, like people who are lower lower,
lower to mid class. And now it's Republicans. I mean,

(06:44):
we'd showed that in the last election, right, which is
and trying to flip that narrative with the rest of
the because a lot of people still buy into the
whole Republicans are all rich people, which we're like, what
because it's.

Speaker 2 (06:56):
Just not the truth. It's absolutely not the truth. And yeah, the.

Speaker 3 (07:01):
Whole oligarchy tour. It turns out that for every billionaire
who donated to Donald Trump's campaign, Kamala Harris had two. Wow,
about seventy percent of Americans and now who make over
five hundred thousand dollars a year are Democrats. Nine of
the ten wealthiest counties in America democrats. Kamala Harris won
the majority of people who make over one hundred thousand dollars.
Trump won the majority of Americans who make under one

(07:22):
hundred thousand dollars a year. I will say I have
to say that you guys probably won't agree with me
about this, but I do feel that not everyone in
the Republican party understands what that means, like it's an
enormous privilege to be the party of labor. But seems
like there's this muscle memory to where sometimes Republicans have
forgotten that. So for example, in the Big Beautiful Bill,

(07:45):
I was really upset, but they were like, I want
tax cuts for working class people, middle class people, but
why are they giving tax cuts to rich people. They're
giving money to Democrats, Like why would you do that?
It makes sense They're just spend it funding your opposition. Like, yeah,
every person in that tack, not every but the vast

(08:06):
majority of the people in that tax bracket hate you
and this opposition.

Speaker 1 (08:13):
This is a safe space where you can feel free
to criticize Trump. We do it all the time, and
I know you know it much to the chagrin of
our audience sometimes. But for example, I think like right now,
Democrats are focusing as they should, and I think it's
smart strategy for them to focus on the economy because people,
regardless of what the data suggests, the economy is still

(08:35):
a struggle for people. And I cringe a little whenever
Trump is like, oh, the you know, the bad economy
is a Democrat hoax. I mean, it's it's not because
if people are feeling high grocery prices, especially if they
are the working class, you know, he doesn't want to
alienate those people. So if you were in his ear
right now, how would you be advising him about messaging

(08:57):
and midterms and twenty twenty eight.

Speaker 3 (08:59):
Even so, it's funny because I actually am kind of
on his side a little bit on this, Like, I mean,
obviously he shouldn't be like affordability, it's a whole should
not be doing that. But it is the case that
Americans feel really bad about the economy despite the fact
that the economy is doing really well. They feel worse
about the economy now than they did in two thousand

(09:21):
and eight. Okay, like we're obviously not in a recession,
so something's happen here now. Obviously it's a losing message
to tell people you're wrong about how you feel about
how much money is in your pay account.

Speaker 2 (09:32):
Right, because the Democrats is said couple exactly what Biden did.

Speaker 3 (09:36):
It's why he longs that said wages have outpaced inflation
by one percent, so people are not it's not as
bad as people feel like it is. Also, in addition,
to this. Trump is making massive, historic, systemic changes to
an economy that, for fifty years, thanks to a handshake

(09:58):
agreement between both parts, was an upward funnel of wealth
from the working class into the pockets of the elites.
He's taken that funnel and just turned it around. And
he did that with tariffs and with mass deportations, with
restoring manufacturing, the trillions of dollars from the Middle East.
He's doing system wide changes to our dependency on China,

(10:20):
to who an employer should expect to be able to
hire and how much he should be able to That
stuff takes a long time. And the question is will
his political runway run out before a person living in
Pennsylvania knows a person who got a job in a
factory that was built with one of these Saudi investments.

(10:44):
That's really the question. I do think it is a
little unfair because he is making massive changes. A truck
driver told me in April, so a couple weeks after
Liberation Day. He said to me, so, wait, let me
understand what you're saying. You're saying to me that he's
going to put the tariffs on I might end up
having to pay a little bit more for something, but

(11:06):
down the road, my kid will have a better shot
at the American dreams. Yes, and you think I'm gonna
turn that deal down, Like my whole life is sacrificing
for my kiddies. Like what do you think working class
life is exact? I think a lot of people feel
that way. And I think if the President could could
go out and say, I understand that prices on groceries

(11:30):
are not where we want them to be. Here's what
I am doing for you. Here's when you can expect
to see these changes. I think that would go a
long way. Another piece of it is this is very
hard to say. I would not advise he say this,
but like, this is the truth. We don't want prices
to go down significantly because if they do, it will

(11:51):
signal that we are in a recession, and it will
mean that wages are dropping. At some point, when people's
wages go up, they can afford more. Prices also go up.
That is a good thing. So if suddenly the price
of beef drops by fifty percent, that will mean people
are not making as much money and that will be bad.

(12:11):
And add to that the fact that we're doing mass deportations.
They're cleaning out a lot of these workplaces that are
full of illegals who have been undercutting the wages of
Americans for forty years. We actually want those Americans that
they're replaced with to make more money. So I think
there is this thing where people don't understand that like

(12:31):
the new normal, you know. And again, this is not
a winning political message, so it's a very tricky thing
to navigate. But part of what President Trump's agenda is
doing is saying to the American people, I want you
to make more money. I think the cost of things
is a little bit of a red herring. The money
is going to things like healthcare premiums that are skyrocketing,

(12:55):
housing insurance that is skyrocketing, insurance for skyrocketing. It's not
really about food so much as the cost of the
American dream. And I would love to see the president
go to these insurance company cartels and say you want
government funding, you're not gonna raise premiums for five years.

(13:16):
I mean, I don't understand why we can't just do
we do that every other issue, every other marketplace. Drugs,
what he just did with drugs. The thing about Trump
is he's a little bit of a mob boss, but yeah,
you know what it is. Yes, every time I'm gonna
raise prices, he just picks up the phone and says,
don't you dare and I won't. Like it's so amazing

(13:37):
to watch. So I think that the real affordability crisis
is not in like day to day goods. It's in
much bigger systemic things. And I do think that, you know,
Secretary Beston is pretty pretty on target over these things.
But again, his political runway might run out before we
have a chance to see all this happen.

Speaker 4 (13:53):
Yeah, that's the thing is it does take time, and
we got to let him cook a little bit.

Speaker 2 (13:56):
That's what we always say that, like, we just let
him cook.

Speaker 4 (13:58):
You know, we have got to talk about the rise
of anti Semitism in this country because it's so what
is that we've been doing this almost twenty years. We've
never seen anything like it. It's becoming mainstream, Batya, And
I don't understand why or how that's okay. I don't
know if it's the newest generation just being emboldened by

(14:23):
a lot of these pundits who think that it's okay
to spew this garbage in the ether.

Speaker 2 (14:30):
I don't get it.

Speaker 4 (14:31):
But what I just want to hear your take on
all of this nonsense.

Speaker 3 (14:34):
Okay, So, first of all, it just means a lot
that you guys have been so on top of this
and so fearless, and how you've taken this on like
it's really amazing. A lot of people are scared to
utter certain people's names, and you guys have been utterly fearless.
And I think, to myself and to probably a lot
of your Jewish listeners, it's just like, from the bottom

(14:56):
of my heart, thank.

Speaker 1 (14:56):
You, thank you God, regnizing that we hate that it's
not like this is not a universal right and right.

Speaker 2 (15:04):
We hate that you have to thank us for that.
But you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (15:08):
I do, and God bless and protect you for everything
that you've done for the Jewish people. Now that said,
I am a little bit of a skeptic of the
rising anti Semitism phenomenon.

Speaker 1 (15:19):
Good, I want to hear some optimism. Yes we do,
We absolutely do.

Speaker 3 (15:23):
We had a little bit of a fight on Thanksgiving
over this because we're at friends' houses and they're you know,
Ukrainian immigrants, Jewish immigrants, and they're talking about how America
is getting anti Semitic I have a character flaw where
I can't stand hearing people unfairly criticize my homeland. And
my husband could see, like, you know, my and he
was like, Babe, please please, I forget. I couldn't. I

(15:45):
just can't sit there. I really feel that Americans, the
American people historically and persisting to this day, are unbelievably
protective of their Jewish neighbors. There's never been a country
that has been as protective of Jews as America, and
I think that that by and large is still the case.

Speaker 1 (16:07):
Really, even after all the campus psycho crazy everything.

Speaker 3 (16:13):
So I think that in America, anti Semitism has always
been by and large a phenomenon relegated to the elites.
So whenever you have elite intro fighting, you're going to
see anti Semitism. So this happened, for example, in the
Gilded Age, where you suddenly had these robber barons coming

(16:33):
up from the bottom making millions and millions of dollars
and then wanting to join the high society elites. And
of course the high society elites had no interest in this,
and so you saw anti Semitism come out there because
they would say to them, oh, you guys are just
a bunch of Jews. Okay, that's an example of elite
anti Semitism developing as a result of intra elite conflict.

(16:58):
And I think that that's really like the campus anti semitism,
even that it only took place at the most elite
of the elite universities. You go to state schools, you
go to places where pell grants represent over sixty percent
of the student's zero pro power.

Speaker 2 (17:17):
Sign right about that? Yeah, you are right, You are
totally right.

Speaker 3 (17:20):
Very similar is happening now on the right where some
very wealthy content creators who make their money off of
engagement seem to have forgotten or the people looking at
that and saying, oh, no, Americans are anti Semitics seem
to have forgotten that the Internet is available globally. A
new study just came out proving something I have been

(17:42):
saying for a very long time, which is that Nick
Fouentis's following is not by and large American. Yes, the
people amplifying him are across the globe. Candice Owens, I
would wanger very similar that there is a huge appetite
for her content and in a lot of Muslim countries,
not gonna specify why, but you can you know that, yeah.

Speaker 2 (18:05):
We can figure out why. Yeah, And I will look at.

Speaker 3 (18:09):
These, you know, the look at a video from Canada.
Stones has five million views, and they'll say, wow, five
million young Americans agree with this. It's like no, probably
four million Lebanese people agree with it, you know, and
young board people are watching it. Maybe here doesn't mean
they agree with it. We all have our you know,
guilty things that we listen to and don't agree with.

(18:29):
So I think it's really overstated. I think the polling
shows again and again the American people very philo Semitic,
very protective, certainly of American Jews. Now Israel has gotten unpopular.
It fought an unpopular war. I think it was a
just war. You think it was a just war. It
was a very punishing war. And I think that the

(18:50):
sentiment people feel right now is not the sentiment they'll
feel in five years. And at the last Student Action Summit,
Charlie Kirk had this amazing focus group with the young leaders.
It's really interesting. It's on YouTube. I recommend everybody watching it.
First of all, he pulled the five thousand students there,
young conservative college students seventy five percent of them said

(19:12):
they were pro Israel. The overwhelming majority, despite how they
feel about Israel, would rather the Christian holy sites obviously
be under the care of the Jews, then the rights.

Speaker 2 (19:23):
Yes, yes, what.

Speaker 3 (19:25):
They are is they're done with foreign aid, you know,
and honestly me too, as an American, I'm done with it.
And I think it hurts Israel to be taking this
much money from us, to be honest, it gives us
power over them and over their decisions. We saw how
that was utilized against them in the early stages of
the war. It's enough. Israel's a very rich country. They

(19:45):
should be using that money we should have. We should
turn that aid into some trade relationship, isn't it.

Speaker 1 (19:51):
Though I thought it was all about, like they end
up we give them this money, they end up buying
like a ton of our weapons, and it all kind
of works out in both of our benefits.

Speaker 3 (20:00):
It's a funnel from ours the taxpayer, into like Lockheed
Martin's pocket, right, And I think, so it's not really trade.
It's not that these relies are buying weapons from us.
It's that we're buying weapons from US for Israel. So
it is spent in our economy. I you know, I
you know, probably a lot of American jobs rely right,
but you know it's it's it's a question of sovereignty
for me. Both American and israel I do believe we

(20:23):
get a lot out of that relationship. We will lose
that access to intelligence sharing to Israel fighting a lot
of our enemies for US if they don't, you know,
get that aid from us. But if the American people
decide that that's where we're at, young people say, look,
I can't afford a home, I don't want to that intelligence.
Show me that that's really worth it. Let's take ten
years without it. That's totally fair. I mean, that's in

(20:44):
a democratic society, that's kind of what would happen. So
all of which is just to say that certainly on
the right I think. And oh and one more piece
of this is so much of the attention right now
is given to conservatives on college campes. But you have
to understand the vast majority of people with a college

(21:04):
degree again are Democrats. So the percentage of young conservatives
who are represented by young conservatives on campuses, it's really small.
Like if you think the average like young truck driver
or Welder is sitting there having like negative thoughts about Jews.
I just find that really like not consistent with my

(21:24):
experience traveling this entire country talking to people, and you
know what it's it's like, I feel like I'm sort
of the alone in saying this because obviously there's a
lot of adjuta around it. I think there are people
who are you know, Tucker Carlston, for example, his content
has become almost exclusively focused on totally Israel and Jews.

(21:48):
Canieans of course historically putting up content. You have Nick
Fuent as a white nationalists, extremely anti black as well,
racist right.

Speaker 2 (21:57):
Right, anti woman. Yeah, but you have like the onus.

Speaker 3 (22:02):
Is on the people interpreting this stuff and interpreting the
views not to get carried away. And the lesson to
keep in mind, I think is, you know, the less
online campaign always wins. And the Democrats made a huge
mistake in twenty sixteen to where they basically thought that
they're online influencers and activists and radicals who are policing

(22:27):
everyone and calling everybody racist and yadayada represented where the
country was. They did the same thing in twenty twenty
four and they lost to Trump, who was out there
talking to people who has just the most amazing, innate
connection with his base with the American working class, and
now you see Republicans making the same mistake. I think
this is what happened with Marjorie Taylor Green. She got

(22:48):
too online. She puts out one statement that's critical of Israel.
Suddenly it gets five million views instead of five hundred thousand,
and she's like, Oh, this is where the country is at. No,
that's not where the country is. You have to talk
to regular people and just get off of Twitter because
as we see now, like this is all just foreign bots.

Speaker 2 (23:07):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (23:07):
So I gotta ask, then, like, what is the right
strategy in your view in responding to some of the
crazy that comes from Candace, from Tucker, from Marjorie? Is
it to kind of ignore it to some degree or
claim these are my friends so I'm not going to
criticize them kind of like Megan, who we adore is doing.

(23:27):
Or is it right to get loud like Tim Poole
is and just explode on these people because we tend
to fall into the Timpool camp where we're like, this
is insane and we have to say something about it.

Speaker 3 (23:40):
I love you guys's approach because you laugh at it.
I think that's so powerful you just kind of make
fun of it. Timpool's amazing, Dana lash has been amazing.
I think, you know, between the ignoring it and the
laughing at it. You know. The thing I don't like
to see is like, you know, the ADL approach where
it's like we must you know, like to take it

(24:01):
too seriously. I think is like a huge mistake. The
interesting thing about Tucker Crosson is he's very close with
the vice president and with the president's son. To me,
it really seems like the president has kind of marginalized him.
I was started noticing that already towards the end of
the campaign. But I think it's totally fair for voters
to say, look, I'm not going to vote for someone

(24:22):
until I know whether this is the foreign policy that's
going to be dictating you know, the future nominee or
not that I think those are fair questions for journalists
to be asking. I just to me, the sort of
hysteria around it is like, I just feel like it's
a little bit I guess. I mean, I feel bad
saying this, but like that when people get like a

(24:43):
little too this is all they talk about. I feel
a little bit like like this is not where the
country is at, Like this is not It's like if
you're asked about it, obviously like you know, have an
opinion whatever, But to misread this as where the nation
is is like, I don't know. I think that's a

(25:03):
big mistake. Now that said, like anyone who cannot say
there's no room for Nick Fuentes in the GOP. You
can't say that you're gonna lose and you deserve to lose,
Like that's not you know what I mean, Like that's
a completely I was very upset buring the twenty twenty
four campaign. I forget what it was, but there was
actually a very interesting moment where it was announced that

(25:26):
Don Junior was going to be at a crypto event
and then when the poster came out, Candice Owens was
on it. And I had been telling Jews, you need
to vote for Trump, like he he is the candidate.
He is the pro worker candidate you think you're voting
for when you're voting for Kamal Harris, right, And so
when I saw that poster or my heart sort of sank.

(25:46):
But within six hours she was dropped from the event,
like she had added herself after the fact, and it's
my understanding. I was told from sources that she had
been desperate to join the twenty twenty four campaign and
they had the good sense to be like, no, wow,
I know. It was very like I remember when the
person was explaining this to me, Like the person that

(26:07):
I was in touch with called me immediately to say
he said yes to this before she was part of it,
and she will not be there, don't worry. And I
sort of choked up, like I was like, oh, he
is the person that I thought he was. You know,
like there's those moments where like you get this like
oh my gosh, should I.

Speaker 4 (26:23):
They get it? Yeah, he gets it. So do you
think so based on your optimism? And I love it.

Speaker 2 (26:29):
I love the optimism here.

Speaker 4 (26:31):
That's we're all about that, right, And based on that,
do you have any trepidation about the midterms or about
the next election? Do you think that we are because
some people are like we're fractured, and I feel like,
you know, there are times where we're like, oh my god,
you know, are we becoming fractured as a party? And
is this happening because of some of these people who
are spewing this absolute vile garbage, or or do you

(26:53):
think that there is nothing to worry about at all?
Do you think that we're gonna be okay?

Speaker 3 (26:58):
People forget that there were like pretty like harsh on
Israel Republicans in the very recent past. It used to
be that the Democratic Party was more pro Israel than
the Republican Party. I think it's totally fair to have
a conversation about foreign policy like that. We have to
be able to say, I want to hear how young

(27:19):
people hear this think about it, you know like that.
I think that's very important. I don't think that that
should be seen as a referendum on how they feel
about Jews specifically. Now, obviously there's like language that gets
a little bit close to the line. On the other hand,
you know, we do give Israel money. It's nowhere close

(27:41):
to the biggest lobby. It's in seem to me that
people are more about that than about, for example, the
healthcare lobby, which I think are a bunch of basically
like cartels. Let's focus on that. But you know, some
conversations are really important, Like for example, Trump's primary challengers
is in twenty twenty four, let's talk about Nicki Haley. Okay,

(28:03):
by the way, outspent Trump two to one, Kama Harris
outspent Trump three to one. Like, wow, the whole Citizens
United thing. I like, as a you know, I used
to be like a really good lefty. I thought this
was the end of democracy. But it turns out if
you have a good candidate, doesn't matter how much money
you spent. But okay, Nikki Haley right, obviously wanted to
get back to the pre maga on everything. Trump's not

(28:26):
a conservative. He's you know, believes abortion should be legal
for somewhere between six to twelve weeks. That was extremely
important to a lot of women who had never voted
for a Republican before feeling like they could vote for
a Republican. He doesn't believe in free trade, you know,
like he thinks that corporate I mean even in Chris

(28:47):
Clmo was telling me this the other day, even back
in two thousand and eight, he was saying, why are
we bailing out the banks? Give the people the money
to buy their homes, right right, Like, this is who
he is. And then on foreign policy, he's very anti war.
He's he's not anybody's Patsy he's very anti terrorist, but
he's a Shitti war Now, Nicko was clearly trying to

(29:08):
get back to that pre Maga version of the GOP.

Speaker 2 (29:12):
She's a hawk.

Speaker 3 (29:13):
She's a hawk, she believes in free trade, she believes
in foreign interventions. Social conservative. Like that conversation, that debate,
we're gonna have that like in twenty twenty eight. I
guess it will be. That's gonna be an and we have.
That's a great debate to have. Like just like it's
great to have a debate between Gavin Newsom, who's gonna
come out on the open borders thing, and you know

(29:35):
whoever the MAGA person is, who's like, sorry, we're gonna
ramp up the deportations. Like these are healthy debates for
the country to have. It's going to be a healthy
debate in the GOP. It's also going to be very bruising,
and I just what I would hate to see is
like faux outrage over things that are not anti Semitic
clouding the legitimate debates over Israel, instead of just everyone

(29:59):
on the ticket saying Fuentes know, Candice know, but you
know what, let's have a healthy debate about the role
of our Middle East policy, for example. So I want
us to have like, but that's easy for me to
say to women like you who have been doing all
of the hard work, like battling back the people who

(30:20):
refuse to denounce. So I think it's a tricky thing.
And like, again, like part of me just wants to
be like, I'm so grateful, like when you see Ted
Cruz being like this is gonna be my one issue.
At one level, I'm like, God, that's so sweet. But
on the other level, I'm sort of like, do we
really want that? Is that like the healthiest approach to me?

(30:44):
Sure that we're having the best possible conversation about that.

Speaker 2 (30:47):
And I love that about you.

Speaker 1 (30:49):
I love that, Yeah, I mean that one of the
one of the reasons that we constantly play your clips
is because you will say things in a way and
you have an amazing talent for it of just putting
things in a way that we're like, yeah, that she
got into my brain and took words that I didn't
even know I had in my brain and like made
them into sentences that make sense to people. And so

(31:12):
I love that you're everywhere now that you have your
own show, and like I just want to know, because
I know Amy Joe has a final question for you,
which is my favorite, and she'll get to that in
a second.

Speaker 3 (31:20):
But how high does your blood pressure.

Speaker 1 (31:23):
Get when you were on Abby Phillips's show, because you
are dealing with some crazy on that show.

Speaker 3 (31:33):
You know, it's funny because on the panel it never
feels as bad. The problem is is that there are
like six or seven journalists whose job it is to
watch it and think, oh, if I clip it right here, yes,
like it'll look like she made a real fool of herself.
And then we can put the headline maga person makes
full of hers you know, yeah, that is sort of

(31:55):
like I'll see those headlines and I'll be like, God,
you guys are so dishonest, Like, just be honest about it.
I have to say, I give Abby such props, and
I give CNN such props because I think I'm a strong,
good defender of the president's agenda in a way that
I try to make it most palatable to leftists. They

(32:17):
don't have to put me on, they don't have to
put Scott Jennings on. They could put on and sometimes
you know, when we're not on, I'll be watching the show,
and I'll be like, God, like you know, the bag
of person is just like screwing.

Speaker 2 (32:27):
It up, you know, like they could they.

Speaker 3 (32:30):
Focus on those people, and I feel really honored that
they put me on that panel so often and give
me the opportunity. It's it's truly amazing, and I you know,
I get that it's very hard to watch sometimes because
people feel like get really frustrated, and I sometimes when
I'm watching it, get very frustrated. Sometimes you know, you'll

(32:50):
somebody will fact check you and they'll just be wrong,
and it's that can be very frustrating. But like if
you if you feel that you've done the best you can,
Like I always pray before I go on, and I say, like, God,
let me just represent you well and my people well,
and let me be a uniter and not a divider.

(33:11):
And it's like when I come here, right like I
can say things in the way that, like I know
the people who agree with me will get the most
pleasure out of And I go there, I'm trying to
say it in a way that I'm saying the same stuff.
I'll never say something I don't believe, but in a
way that people who don't agree with me, will have
the biggest chance of saying, well, at least that's a

(33:33):
human making that point, you know. And I don't always
manage to do that. On immigration, for example, like I'm
extremely extremely hawkish, and after being called a Nazi and
a white supremacist for five years for things in New
York time, will now admit is true. I'm done like
doing the whole throat clearing, right, So I like when

(33:55):
that issue comes up, then my blood will start to
and you'll see me, Like if you go to my
Instagram clips where I'm talk about immigrainshit, I just am like,
oh my gosh. You know. But it's I think it's
like a it's always it's always a balance because you
are being given this immense opportunity to talk to the
scene and audience, you know, and it's like, what if

(34:16):
something I say makes them think I'm sure Scott made
some of those people vote for Trump. Oh sure, that's
just an amazing privilege. So I try to keep it,
take it in stride and think about it that way.

Speaker 2 (34:26):
I love it.

Speaker 1 (34:26):
It's really really good, I know, right, I love it
because we would be we would out there throwing fists.
I know.

Speaker 2 (34:33):
Again, with the optimism. We love it. Yeah, that so much.

Speaker 3 (34:37):
So.

Speaker 2 (34:38):
The final question is, and it's.

Speaker 4 (34:41):
Probably silly to some people, but I always ask people like,
tell us something about you that people would not know
if they went out to Google and looked and try
to find everything about you.

Speaker 2 (34:51):
Tell us something.

Speaker 4 (34:52):
Tell our audience something about you, like a hobby or
something about you that they wouldn't know that's surprising about Batya.

Speaker 2 (35:01):
Like what do you do in.

Speaker 4 (35:02):
Your spare time? What do you do that is that
you love to do that something like we wouldn't know about.

Speaker 3 (35:08):
My favorite place to be when I'm not at work
is at the soup kitchen. I really yes, of course.

Speaker 2 (35:15):
It is, Like why is not even a surprise? Like
but it's not worthy of this interview for a good reason.

Speaker 3 (35:21):
Like there's a lot of like workplace drama there, but
workplace drama that's not your drama. But you know all
the characters. It's very delicious. I mean, I just love
being there for a lot of reasons. But it's not
they're not all very noble.

Speaker 2 (35:34):
How long have you been doing that? How long have
you done that?

Speaker 3 (35:37):
But yeah, the Sukisien goo tuna I've been going to
for like three or four years, like I can't remember
when exactly, during the pandemic, I started going to that one,
and I just love I love seeing the regulars. I
love like the people who work there, whose job it is,
who are like just much less happy than me to
be Oh my god, I'm very happy to be there.
I will say another thing that's just like not known

(35:57):
about me as much, I guess because my husband's very
verse to social media. He doesn't like me mentioning him
or talking about him. He's not on social media except
something to go on to read the nasty comments about
me and chuckle to himself. But I'm married to Like,
I'm madly love with my husband. We've been together for
fifteen sixteen years, and he's my best friend and he's
my my Like in the Bible, it says when God

(36:19):
created Eve, he created an ezer connecto and Nebrew that
means a help meet. But the word connecto, you would
think it would mean a help meet for him, but
it's a help meet against him. The word connecto means
against And all of the interpreters try to explain, like
what that would mean, why would you need to help
meet against you? But my husband really is that because

(36:40):
he doesn't agree with me about a lot, and so
we debate politics a lot. He's sort of my first
line of defense because by the time I get to
Abby's panel, I've heard like the smartest version of every
possible counter attack, so much so that sometimes I'll be
in a debate and I'll say something and the person
opposite me, well sort of, I'll be like, I'll think, oh, shoot,

(37:01):
I know exactly what they're going to say, because I'll
think of what my husband would say. Oh my god,
I don't have answer for that. But then they'll say
something much stupider, and I'm not really gonna get away
with this.

Speaker 2 (37:13):
I love it. I just love fantastic. That's fantastic, that.

Speaker 3 (37:18):
Person who I admire a lot, and he admires me,
which is a really nice thing. When your husband admires you, it's.

Speaker 2 (37:23):
The best thing. I love that. I love things. Thank
you for sharing that with us.

Speaker 1 (37:28):
Thank you so much, and thank you for being here.
We want to make sure that your show on News
Nation on Saturdays is a huge success. So make sure
that people know how to watch, how to find you, like,
how do you want to be found online?

Speaker 2 (37:40):
What's the best way.

Speaker 3 (37:42):
I'm on Twitter, I'm on Instagram. You can watch the
show on News Nation four pm Saturday. They also post
it on Monday morning, the whole show to YouTube, so
you can watch that new YouTube and good I post
a lot of clips and yeah, we're having a good time.
Thank you.

Speaker 4 (37:57):
We're so so excited for your success with you more success.
You're just a fantastic person and we're just delighted to
meet you today.

Speaker 2 (38:04):
So thank you so much by for having me.

Speaker 3 (38:06):
Can I give you guys a blessing before we go?

Speaker 2 (38:09):
Yeah, Oh my god, it would mean the world totally.

Speaker 3 (38:14):
Yeah, Era don panaveyesa don i pana shalom. Thank you.

Speaker 1 (38:21):
So I'm gonna send that to my dad and have
him translate.

Speaker 2 (38:25):
Her dad is Jewish. I love it. Oh my god,
I love it. I got all weepy.

Speaker 4 (38:30):
That is just the sweetest thing. We've had such a
terrible to twenty twenty five. But yeah, the word like
so many things have happened, like to surgeries. She's had surgeries.
I just broke my like so much stuff. So we
are looking and we are we too are very positive people.
But we're very much looking forward to a really awesome
twenty twenty six, so that was just the nice like

(38:50):
icing on top of you know what. We're a good
We'll trying to have a cake in twenty twenty five.
But thank you so much for that, very lovely thank you.

Speaker 3 (39:00):
You ladies are amazing and it was such a pleasure
of being here with you.

Speaker 2 (39:03):
We appreciate you. Thank you, Badya

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