Why Don’t We Focus on Legislatures and Governors | 5/7/25

The very RINOs who are undermining Trump’s agenda are bizarrely securing his endorsement. We begin by showing once again how the endorsements are killing any effort to pass a MAGA agenda. I also comment on the latest policy jockeying with the reconciliation bill. Next, we’re joined by constitutional law professor Josh Blackman for another discussion about judicial supremacy, recent political court cases, and the trajectory of their outcomes. Professor Blackman is not very optimistic in the long run that the Roberts court will fundamentally clip the wings of radical lower courts on enough cases. He offers some fascinating examples of hypocrisy with Roberts rushing in to overturn conservative lower courts while using the emergency shadow docket to keep terrible lower-court rulings alive, even when those issues are pressing. He also believes we are about to get screwed on birthright citizenship at the Supreme Court. The only solution is for other branches to grab back that power. The Florida attorney general is providing us with the test case. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

MAGA Inc. claims to support all of our causes — from deportations and cutting spending to medical freedom, diminishing the FBI, and primarying RINOS. So why don’t you actually lead? Instead, in case after case, Trump is subverting those causes, and all we get are excuses and low expectations. If Trump feels stymied by the courts, he either needs to take a page out of the Florida attorney general’s book or demand that his priorities be placed in reconciliation. Next, I delve into the Casey Means nomination for surgeon general and the disturbing trend of random people and policies popping up at HHS and also other areas like foreign policy and how this ties back to Tucker Carlson, Don Jr., and Arab Qatari money. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I begin with the perfect parable to explain the shortsightedness of the Right in ignoring the opportunities conservatives have in deep-red states. While we have done a few good things in a few states, for the most part, we have failed to pass transformational legislation on most of our priorities. As an example, we focus today on Tennessee and are joined by Gary Humble, executive director of Tennessee Stands. He shows how most of the important bills on immigration and medical freedom were blocked by RINOs and the governor, while they passed terrible bills to abolish local conventions in favor of open primaries. You will come away from today’s episode with a full understanding of where things stand in almost every red state, the potential that exists, and how we will continue to fail if we don’t create organizations like Tennessee Stands and if we fail to reform the primary process. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The entire congressional agenda is about sophistry and small-ball items with no narrative or vision to take to the voters. Yet when it comes to Real ID, something all voters, including liberals, hate, suddenly there is a rush to implement it after 20 years of delays. We’re joined today by Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.), who is one of the few members raising concerns about the Trump administration’s implementation of Real ID. As someone who follows the issue of gun registries, Burlison is concerned that a Democrat president will turn Real ID into a mass surveillance state and eventually use it as a global ID that could lead to policies like vaccine passports. This is part of a broader anarcho-tyranny whereby our government casts a wide net around civil liberties under the guise of security but then fails to actually deliver when it comes to security issues. Burlison also warns that leadership is telling the RINOs the spending cuts are not real or will be gutted by the Senate. Finally, we discuss the disturbing decision from the Trump DOJ to keep Biden’s dangerous abortion pill regulation that turns every mailbox into an abortion clinic and plans to fight red states seeking to overturn it.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We cannot allow ourselves to be distracted by political squirrels and symbolism while losing the issues on substance. Trump needs to lead by calling policy plays on judicial reform in reconciliation. Next, we’re joined by hero ENT specialist Dr. Mary Talley Bowden, who is warning about the pattern of underperformance both at the federal level and in red states on rectifying the mistakes of COVID and banning the COVID shots. Why are the COVID shots still on the CDC’s childhood schedule? Why is there more funding into flu vaccines? Bowden boldly asserts that MAHA was designed as a redirection movement to focus on dyes in food rather than the 800-pound gorilla. Dr. Bowden also updates us on state based initiatives and how the Texas Medical Board is still destroying her career for trying to treat COVID patients in distress. How is there no national movement to pressure Governor Abbott (R) and Texas leaders to pass reforms to the medical tyranny in what should be a red state? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The way to fulfill the mandate on inflation and invasion is to make sure our pressure on the White House is equal to the counter-pressure from the special interests. I discuss how Trump must champion judicial reform in budget reconciliation and how exactly it can be done. Also, why is it always Chip Roy having to fight every battle in the House? On the Senate side, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) is leading the fight for a better budget reconciliation bill. He joins us today to lay out his vision and strategy for re-focusing budget reconciliation to actually cut spending. He lays out the problem and the solution in great detail and calls on Trump to lead. The current one-bill strategy was a mistake on multiple fronts, and the senator is promising that no amount of pressure will get him to relent. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There is nowhere to run or hide from GOP perfidy in supermajority red states where Democrats are a non-factor. We begin by going over a list of Republican betrayals in a bunch of deep-red states. Nowhere is this more evident than in Texas. We’re joined by our good friend Texas state Rep. Brian Harrison (R), who exposes that not only are House Republican leaders blocking good bills, they are now passing bills to expand corporate welfare, grow the budget, and censor political speech. They have literally empowered Democrats to preside over the chamber. What’s worse, they are using a lackluster “school choice” bill to absolve themselves from subverting us on every other issue. Finally, I discuss the problem with Trump not promising to endorse every Texas RINO and how he continues to fight conservatives but won’t condemn the RINOs when they block his stated policies and even Senate nominees.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The economy was in bad shape under Biden and will continue to slide into stagflation until we get spending back to pre-COVID levels. I go through an assortment of statements from various Republicans demonstrating how they don’t have plans to meaningfully cut a single program. Next, we’re joined by South Dakota House Speaker Jon Hansen (R) and his speaker pro tem, Karla Lems, who have announced their run for governor and lieutenant governor, respectively. They discuss their record of fighting for landowners and how they plan to take it to the next level in the executive branch. Hansen is promising to make South Dakota the graveyard for the Green New Deal, stand up to the special interests, block left-wing initiative petitions, and cut property taxes. How is he different from other candidates? He actually single-handedly fought for these ideals when it was hard and when it actually mattered. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Everyone is commenting on the Canadian elections, but what most on the Right are missing is that we are on our way to becoming like Canada in the sense that we can’t elect conservatives even in culturally conservative parts of the nation. I raise concerns about Greg Abbott’s comments that Trump will endorse Texas RINOs. Next, we’re joined by Nathan Dahm, director of the Oklahoma Freedom Caucus, who briefs us on a Supreme Court case stemming from liberal Republican Attorney General Gentner Drummond suing the state school board for approving charter school status for a Catholic school. What’s worse is that the state supreme court sided with him! Dahm explains why Oklahoma’s institutions continue to be liberal despite the state’s voting patterns. The Freedom Caucus is battling entrenched RINOs who are blocking judicial reform and education reform and are also trying to gum up the primaries. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Trump came into office with enormous political capital and an unprecedented bully pulpit. He could have used that to push transformational things through budget reconciliation and to build a right-wing party with better primary endorsements. It’s not that he didn’t signal a lot of good policies in a vacuum; it’s that he chose to blow his capital on the tariff gambit, which has now drained his political support without having enacted a single major policy. I express my concern about where we will land in two and four years from now due to the lack of pressuring Congress, ignoring the courts, and making the right endorsements in red states. Meanwhile, there are always superficial, aesthetic distractions that keep the grift corps from demanding that we right the ship and actually fulfill the mandate. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices