The Candace Owens Erika Kirk Problem is So Bad, Kristi Noem GRILLED, & Trump's “Affordability Hoax”

This Candace Owens, Charlie Kirk's turning point USA, and now Erica Kirk herself situation, it is spiraling out of control. And it is very much threatening to cause a forever divide in the Republican Party. Because just a quick recap for those of you

that are joining us on chapter 73 of this whole situation, Candace Owens has been insisting that there is more to the story of Charlie Kirk's assassination than what we've been told. And you know, over time, she's kind of cycled through pretty much everyone, either accusing them or kind of alluding or going something doesn't smell right,

involved in Charlie Kirk's death. Right, and she has a particular fixation on the French as well as Egyptian planes following Erica Kirk for years. But most recently, she's taken aim at Charlie's own organization, Turning Point USA,

saying that she thinks that Charlie was betrayed by those close to him. And you know, we've talked about this fairly extensively. Some people just kind of amused by the drama, others maybe realizing how important this is as far as the Republican party moving forward. Because Candace Owens isn't some random. Some people try to minimize her,

but she's arguably one of the biggest podcasters in the world. But you know, with all this, the big thing to note is that Candace has been speculating and spreading these conspiracy theories for months. There hasn't been much reaction from the organization itself until recently. Yesterday, in an interview with Fox News, you had Erica Kirk finally responding, at least vaguely.

I do not have time to address the noise. My silence does not mean that I am complacent. Come after me, call me names, I don't care. Call me what you want, go down that rabbit hole, whatever. When you go after the people that I love, and you're making hundreds and thousands of dollars every single episode going after the people that I love because somehow they're in on this.

No, this is not okay. It's not healthy. This is a mind virus. This is a duty to my husband and it's an absolute honor and I will never back down. And so my message to them is to stop, to stop.

And she echoed that sentiment in an interview with CBS, except this time directly referencing Candace herself.

The podcaster Candace Owens, okay? At one time, a friend of Charlie's, at one time, an employee of Turning Point. She has been one of the main peddlers of these conspiracies. What do you want to say to her and the other people that are putting these lies out into the world right now?

Stop. That's it. That's all I have to say.

Stop.

And so as you might expect, Candace appeared to take all of this very personally, and in her latest video, she absolutely slammed Erica's responses overly emotional.

Whoa, whoa, Erica Kirk shuts down the,

no, she didn't even respond to one of the conspiracies. She gave us emotion. She gave us emotion. She said, I'm a mother, I am a wife, and we never asked about whether she was mother or wife. We want to know if she's a CEO and a chairman.

And a CEO and a chairman has to complimentalize. A CEO, okay, does not get to respond and say, that's my family. If you really care about your team, answer the questions. Okay? Just demystify the entire event.

Answer, come out, sit down, answer the questions. So people don't think Turning Point USA looks so suspicious. Don't try to like mom the organization and say, well, mother's upset because people are coming after her kids and all of this multi-million dollar subsidiaries.

That's my children.

Right, you had Candace pushing back hard on the idea that Erica doesn't have time for the noise, highlighting every stop on her recent press tour, as well as her appearance at the swearing in ceremony for the new ambassador to India.

Erica Kirk has time. She has time. It is just what she means to say, not her priority, which is you are allowed to prioritize things in your own life, but this is not a matter of time constraint.

It is not her priority to respond to the majority, actually. The majority of people think of this as BS. The majority of people think Turning Point is acting suspicious.

Can this also address Erica's accusations of people that are making money from spreading these conspiracy theories online?

So since Charlie has died, that organization has taken in $140 million.

But gosh darn you people that are making hundreds that organization has taken in $140 million.

But gosh darn you people that are making hundreds of dollars every day on YouTube talking about Charlie Kirk's assassination and the BS narrative that is being fed and the very obvious psychological operation that is being employed to make you accept the BS that they are trying to sell to us. Gosh, darn you.

Thousand, did you make a thousand dollars today? Speaking about Charlie Kirk? Well, you should be ashamed of yourself, says Turning Point USA.

And Ken has later added to that argument in a tweet saying, it is a positively absurd notion that you cannot critique a $150 million organization because the CEO says they are like a family and are grieving. And saying, it is the exact same emotional strategy deployed by Black Lives Matter

in the wake of George Floyd's death when I called out their shady financial dealings. I rejected it then and I wholly reject it now. And then in addition to responding to Erica, you had Candace addressing Tucker Carlson, who's recently started asking his own questions

about Charlie's assassination and expressing some doubt about the official story. The FBI has this case and of course the state of Utah. It's their job to not only find out what happened, present it to the public in a way that restores some confidence that you can like have justice in this country,

that we have functioning law enforcement. I don't have confidence in that because there's a lot of evidence that we don't have that. So restore confidence by being honest and telling a story that makes sense. So why, if they don't do that and they haven't done that,

they have not done that, how can you be mad at Candace Owens or anyone else

for filling a vacuum that they left?

And then Tucker, he later reiterated his distrust of the official story as well as the FBI in his own video that he posted on X. Of course, we shouldn't like invent theories to discredit the FBI, but it's not enough to have government officials tell us, well, this is the truth.

We have a right, probably an obligation to say, well, can you prove it? And if you can't, I don't have to believe you. It is the job of the FBI to find out what happened and to tell the rest of us, not hide behind, well, it's national security, confidential sources. No, tell us what happened.

Show us what happened. Convince us what happened. That's your job. Also, it's definitely worth noting that the situation, it's just continues stoking the flames between Candace Owens and Tim Pool.

Right, both right-wing creators have been consistently trading shots on X, as well as on their respective shows, each accusing the other of being mentally unwell. And then while all this has been happening, there's the matter of the TPUSA livestream that Blake Neff, the producer of the Charlie Kirk show, sort of invited Candace onto,

but only on the condition that she make an in-person appearance. Right in there, you had Candace saying she hadn't make the date that they picked, December 15th, work in person. But still saying, you know, she would be more than happy to appear virtually. But to that, you had Blake Neff responding, saying, yesterday, we made it clear

that we would be scheduling a formal response to the allegations and accusations you have made. We've decided that response will be delivered during a live stream on December 15th. Thank you for your response, letting us know you will not be joining proceeding without you." And Neff also responded to another user accusing him of mishandling this whole thing by saying,

"'Of course, it isn't how you book a guest. We are not booking a guest and never said we were. We are delivering a response to several months of escalating harassment and lies.' She was given the opportunity to join and decline." But there you had Candace heading back,

saying that at no point did they say that her presence in that live stream, before then adding, there was nothing sincere about what you did following that announcement and you deserve the ratio you're getting. Frankly, nothing has felt sincere

about the organization since Charlie passed. And with all this, I mean, you even had someone calling into the Charlie Kirk Show asking why they've been so difficult about this.

One thing that I'm just trying to make come together in my head is why the invitation was extended to Candace,

but not to Candace directly.

What was approved is we announced we are going to respond to this. And what I said was, we are going to announce a date soon. We actually hadn't agreed on it at the time I read the statement. We're going to announce a date where we're going to respond to this. And once we announce it, Candace is free to attend in person. That is what we announced. And so once we agreed on a time, I announced what

the time was going to be. Candace, for her part, had said, you name the time, you name the place. That is what we did. Lastly, on the point of why it's in person, I think it's pretty intuitive that given what is being said, what the way this has worked is that it's critical to be in person if you want to be authentic and to be detailed.

And that is what we think is a fair request to make if she's going to participate. But regardless, it is going to go forward because we have agreed that some response needs to be made.

Now with all this, I do want to note, I don't have a dog in this fight. I am just watching them fight it out. But it does feel notable that Blake Neff is making the argument that you need to be in person, to be authentic and detailed,

but his co-host is appearing virtually. So you know, just going to throw that little bit into the conversation. But anyway, as far as the short term, it looks like it's probably not gonna happen, the TPUSA Candace Owens livestream. But we should also expect fireworks because obviously she's either gonna do a livestream while it's happening or do something to respond.

And then that is gonna just kind of continue this cycle that we've been seeing of just right-wingers going after one another. And so with that, one of the long-term questions is, will they eventually get back together? Or will there just be a winner, right? Is everyone kind of just going after audience right now? Especially because as time goes on, it is feeling more and more apparent

that Charlie Kirk seemed to be a calming force for the right, like kind of a manager of sorts. Where you look to certain things, like Trump was saying, right-wingers need to stop talking about the Epstein files. And Charlie Kirk seemed more than happy to follow suit. And then once people saw that,

there were a number of right-wingers that followed Charlie. And while that was definitely not universally the case, it was something that was meaningful enough to have an impact. You know, for now, the fight for the hill or the throne, it continues, and we'll have to see what this means

about the future of politics and the future of the Republican party. And then there's more I've got to talk about in just a minute, but first let me say, you know, my knee, it made sounds yesterday that I'm pretty sure was Morse code for call a doctor. And if you know, if that sounds familiar, you can also insert your own glitchy body part here. The point stands, right?

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That's Z-O-C-D-O-C.com slash Phil. ZotDoc.com slash Phil. But then next up today, we've got to talk about how Trump, he's calling afford as people have been increasingly turning to GoFundMe to just pay for their basic needs. Right, you may not know this, but GoFundMe

actually does a year in help, which another way to think of it is like Spotify wrapped, but for donations on the platform. And while it's meant to kind of uplift you about all the millions of donations that helped worthy causes, right,

highlight all the people that stepped up and other times of need. It's also kind of, I think the technical term is a fucking bummer to see how many people needed help at all. Because essential expense fundraising for things like rent and utilities, it went up 20% this year. And when you look at the fastest growing categories

this year, it was charity followed by just monthly bills. And again, while you've got Trump out there saying, hey, affordability obviously a good thing that there are people out there that are willing to help, that they are helping, it points to the fact that a ton of people are just struggling to make ends meet.

Right, GoFundMe shouldn't be the standard social safety net. But between the end of October and the start of November, there was a 6X increase in food related fundraisers which is on the site, and that obviously lines up with the government shutdown pausing snap and government employees missing paychecks. And you know, also with this, I'll say, well, Donald Trump

is obviously getting the spotlight here because he's talking about affordability being a hoax, and he is the president of the United States who really talked about trying to help people afford things and pay for things. I do want to note, it's not exclusively a Trump thing. fundraisers, they've been increasing over the last three years on GoFundMe and all the country's major English speaking markets.

But also, yes, we can't let this administration off the hook. Affordability is a major issue right now. And in fact, a recent Politico poll found that just nearly half of all Americans find that groceries, utilities, healthcare, housing, and transportation are difficult to afford.

And roughly a quarter of Americans skipped either a medical in the last two years because of costs. And this is touching so many different facets of life. I mean, childcare costs are up 30% since 2020. And the list of things being impacted, it just goes on and on. Yet we have a president who yesterday, I mean, we talked about it, said that the whole affordability thing

is a democratic hoax.

But they have a new word, you know, they always have a hoax.

The new word is affordability. You know, that would be an ignorant, stupid statement on its own, but it is extra ignorant and extra stupid because that is literally how we kicked off a whole tour about affordability. And then, you know, connecting this back to the GoFundMe news, the most used words in fundraiser descriptions,

it included work, home, bill, and food. So, you know, that gives you a sense that affordability is in fact a very real issue. And with that, you had GoFundMe CEO even telling the AP that people needing to ask for help on rent and other bills, that's a function of what's going on in these economies. And what is interesting is that people do step up and support folks in those situations.

And there, you know, it speaks to not only are there people that wanna try and help, but also because there is no hope or trust that anything's going to come from the government. You know, with this, and obviously this part is now my opinion This is not how a fucking government or society should operate if times are hard or tragedy strikes You shouldn't have to hope that mr. Beast is gonna

You know put you in a fucking game so you can put a roof over your head or put some food in your mouth And you know while over the years I've gone after Democrats and Republicans for not doing enough to address these issues It feels like we are at a time where we have an administration that is almost purposefully trying to exacerbate these problems. And I'm often just left wondering, I don't know if some of the people that are supporting him that are being negatively impacted have like a humiliation or a submission kink, but what is it going to take? You've got so many of these grifters saying, hey, everyone's doing great, look at the stock market, which if you actually look into, at least for the United States, is a big bet on AI, outside of AI,

like there's been very little growth. The idea that that's an indicator that most Americans are doing well is crazy. That's great for people like me that have income I can move around and stuff like that, but not the average everyday person

that has nothing or a few hundred dollars in their bank account. But anyway, I'll say, what are your thoughts, opinions, and reactions to what we're seeing around affordability and what the president is or is not doing about it right now.

But then moving on to some quick international news, the US Navy are just a bunch of pirates. That is what the Venezuelan government, as well as a lot of people online are saying right now after US ships seized an oil tanker off the Venezuelan coast. And the US government, they're not being shy about it with the Department of Defense quickly releasing footage

of the incident, showing a helicopter landing troops onto the tanker to take it over. And actually right before that was made public, you had Trump delivering the news himself.

We've just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela, large tanker, very large. Largest one ever seized actually.

But really that was all we knew because they didn't give a real reason as to why this tanker was seized. They just said it was seized for a very good reason. And while as I was recording this for you, the administration came out

to try to give out more information saying this tanker was targeted for transporting oil between Venezuela and Iran. Either way, the initial lack of transparency, it led to a lot of questions and demands for answers. And among those questions was, you know, what exactly is going to be done with the oil, to which Trump said that the US will probably just keep it.

And then as far as, well, what's the international reaction going to be, you had Cuba and Iran calling it piracy and, you know, Russian officials, they used the incident to reiterate their support for Venezuela and said,

I really hope that the United States, to conduct such operations will somehow explain, out of respect for other members of the world's community, which facts led them to take such actions." Which really quick, I'm not gonna defend Trump's government here. For Russia to still be mid prolonged invasion of Ukraine,

going like,

hey, you gotta, seems really uncool and unwarranted, is insane. It's like if Diddy released a statement being anti-freak-off and anti-assault. Right, and all of this, it's happening as you had people pointing out that just a month ago, Iran did a similar operation and the US denounced that. Saying, Iran's use of military forces

to conduct an armed boarding and seizure of a commercial vessel in international waters constitutes a blatant violation of international law, undermining freedom of navigation and the free flow of commerce. Saying, we call on Iran to articulate

to the international community the legal basis for its actions." Which obviously made a lot of people feel like Trump was being a bit hypocritical here, since he was willing to recognize the US's authority to enforce its own laws, but not Iran's to enforce theirs. And also seeing Trump do this, it's not the most surprising thing,

because I mean, we even just recently heard Trump refusing to rule out a ground invasion of Venezuela. Also with this, as far as the oil itself and trade itself. You have many saying this sends a chilling message to companies looking to export crude Venezuelan oil, especially because this Trump administration just said this afternoon that it was willing to seize even more tankers

if they were allegedly involved in breaking sanctions. We're saying it also might have a small ripple for US oil. And that is because despite tensions, Venezuela is a founding member of OPEC and sends us 132,000 barrels of oil a day, which may change because of all this. For now, we'll have to wait to see what further fallout there is,

and if there's continued escalation. But then, next up today, we got to talk about Ice Barbie Kristi Noem. Because for the first time, since she was confirmed as the head of Homeland Security, she had to stand in front of Congress today

for just a beating. You know, going into this, not because of the opposition from Democrats, but because her own boss. Right, recently it's been reported that Donald Trump's been considering replacing Noem with someone else as early as January. One official even saying that she was on very thin ice, saying that Stephen Miller was leading the charge and that he and others were just frustrated with her

because she wasn't building new detention centers fast enough. And then you pair that with reportedly several governors calling Trump to voice complaints about Noem's handling of FEMA and disaster relief funds. But then yesterday you had Trump himself dispelling those rumors.

I read a story recently, I'm unhappy with Christie. I'm so happy with her. I mean, we have a close border, we have a border that's the best border in the history of our country. Why would I be unhappy?

She's fantastic actually.

And so when Noem went into the house committee today, you know, she had the president's endorsement, but that also didn't stop protesters from bursting in. I'm very privileged and honored today

to have my family with me. I'd like to introduce them to you.

Stop unframing the law! And compulsion! And deportation!

And in case you're wondering, they are yelling, the power of Christ compels you because they think she's the devil. But anyway, when she actually started getting questioned that the Democrats weren't much friendlier than the protesters. You have misused resources appropriated by Congress.

You've engaged in unethical behavior. You have repeatedly made false and misleading statements to Congress and to the press, and you've undermined the separation of powers and disregarded the role of Congress in the courts. Your options are limited.

Either you're going to resign,

Trump's gonna fire you, or you will be impeached. And with that, Delia Ramirez, who you just heard, is now pressing the House Judiciary Committee to begin impeachment hearings into Nome. Right, and so you have that, as Democrats have also filed articles of impeachment against Health Secretary RFK Jr.

and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in the past week as well. But as for Nome specifically, the alleged unethical conduct, awarded grant money to a firm that she has ties with, as well as the Coast Guard spending $172 million to buy two private jets for her. Not to mention, she allegedly lied to Congress

and ignored the courts. And then, just a lot going on, Congressman Daniel Goldman pressed her on yet another alleged illegal matter.

Immigrants with ongoing asylum applications are legally in this country.

It's a lawful platform.

Okay, so if your department then deports anyone with an ongoing asylum application, you are violating the law, correct? Joe Biden left us with nine, three, five million cases I'm not asking about Joe Biden,

I'm asking you a specific question.

I'm asking you.

on being granted asylum applications

Why are you filibustering? Why can't you answer the question? It's a simple question. If your department deports anyone with an ongoing asylum application, you are not following the law. Don't tell us to change the law.

If you don't like the asylum system, you change the asylum law.

And with this, unfortunately, the grilling got cut short because Noem left the hearing early. Her department, they're in some hot water outside of the House chamber as well. Right, because in case after case, federal judges have been chastising ICE agents

for abusing their power. So I mean, for example, in Oregon, there's a law that used to ban creating a loud or unusual noise, noxious odor, or other nuisance on federal property. But that was recently broadened to include areas is outside federal property that affects, threatens, or endangers federal property or persons on federal property.

And so as a result, federal agents have arrested or threatened to arrest protesters on a sidewalk outside an ICE detention facility who were using a megaphone. And that then led to a lawsuit, and now a judge has temporarily barred the White House

from enforcing that law outside of the facility while the case proceeds. And understand, that's not the first alleged First Amendment violation committed by federal authorities. There's also a situation with a guy who was arrested after playing the Star Wars Imperial March theme at National Guard members in DC.

Which, you know, excuse my language, what a little bitch you have to be to arrest that guy. Oh, did the song hurt your feelings? Meanwhile, as the holidays approach, you've seen some churches altering their traditional nativity scenes

that make a similar statement. So for example, there's one in Boston that removed Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus. And in their place, there was a sign reading, "'Ice was here.'" And that was something that Ice director, Todd Lyons, clutched pearls about

and called absolutely abhorrent, saying that it adds to a dangerous narrative responsible for a more than 1,150% increase in assaults on ice officers. But a big counterpoint you've seen there is many have said what's really driving anti-ICE narratives are the actions of ICE itself. With that in mind, there's a particular example that's been grabbing a lot of attention right now because it's just so shocking. With that being the case of

this young man, a US citizen, who city leaders in Minneapolis say was arrested by ICE for no other reason than he looked Somali.

I was even outside for mere seconds before I seen a masked, masked person running at me full speed. He tackled me, pushed me inside the restaurant, as you can see in the video. I told him I'm a US citizen, what is going on? He didn't seem to care. He dragged me outside through the snow while I was handcuffed, restrained, helpless. And he pushed me to the ground and he put me in a chokehold.

With him saying that he offered to show them his digital passport on his phone, but they declined. And so he offered to provide his name and date of birth, but they declined again. And then with that, adding that after about an hour, they put him in the car and they drove off.

So after I arrived at the facility, they parked up, the gate was closed and they made me step outside in the snow while it was snowing. And they said, we have to scan your face or we're not gonna let you inside the car. So I had no choice. I let them scan my face.

I was so cold. I guess the face thing, I guess it didn't work.

With the men after that saying that they brought him inside the facility and kept him there for another 20 or 30 minutes, telling him there was no medical aid available, even though his hands were numb and his back hurt. And then eventually someone looked at his passport, took his fingerprints and let him go.

But...

I asked him, can you take me back to where you picked me up from? They said, no, you have to walk in the snow.

Though luckily he said eventually his parents were able to pick him up, was outrageous, not just because he's a citizen, but because if they'll do this to him, imagine what they're doing to people with even fewer rights. And in fact, it even had the Minneapolis police chief saying this to him at a press conference.

I apologize that this happened to you in my city with people wearing vests that say police. That's embarrassing.

But that my friends brings us to the end of today's show, but you've got even more just to click away. Or you can think of it as a part two. I've got my brand new podcast, Crashing Out, that just went up recently. It's like the exact opposite of the Philip DeFranco show. And this is, you know, 95% news, 5% opinion. That's the flip of that.

It's a very cathartic watch and listen. It's a very cathartic watch and listen. Or if you want just more news,