BONUS: The Assassination of Charlie Kirk: A Nation Mourns, A Movement Rises

This is an iHeart podcast time how we can save the next generation. We've got our show and the info is an antidote, but we also have a couple books coming out, Clay. That's right. And you can preorder both of them right now and be book nerds just like us. You'll laugh, you'll nod, and you'll get smarter, too. Mine's called Balls. How Trump, young men in sports saved America. And mine is Manufacturing Delusion. How the left uses brainwashing, indoctrination and propaganda against you. Both are great reads. Welcome in. It is going to be a hard show. It is going to be a difficult show. I imagine that a lot of you are like both the buck and myself. It's hard to sleep. May not have gotten a lot of sleep. Probably have been hopefully hugging your kids, your grandkids closer. Um, and trying to deal with the fact that we live in a world where if you have the And I know many of you, sadly, including me, have expected things like these. We've been talking about it, unfortunately, for over a year after president Trump took a bullet to the ear. It's awful. We ended yesterday show. Buck and I, if you watch on video are regularly scrolling through our phone to make sure that we are the absolute best informed and get you information as fast as we possibly can. And buck saw it first yesterday during the show. And I could see in his face that something was very bad. Um, and unfortunately about an hour after the show ended, buck, you were basically on Fox news when it happened. And Charlie Kirk is gone. 31 years old. Uh, he leaves behind a young son, young daughter, very, very young son and loving wife. And they killed him because they did not like his political opinions. And we're going to talk a lot about this and have a big conversation with all of you. But I think at its essence, this is where words are. Violence leads to, I think if you have to boil it down, the left has accepted the idea that if you or I, or any of us say something that they do not like, that violence is an appropriate response. And where this event, this assassination took place was in many ways, perfectly reflective of the impact that Charlie Kirk has had in his life on a college campus with an open mic, where anyone on the campus could walk up and tell him why he was wrong. And they could debate anything under the sun. And he had done this and he was so profoundly successful at it that he had particularly moved the hearts and minds of many young men and buck. I'll toss it to you here in a sec, but let me tell you this, my two oldest boys, their entire school today in Nashville, dressed up in coats and ties in honor of Charlie Kirk. And you went to a school where you had to dress up sometimes. Let me tell you, these boys don't want to wear coats and ties. They usually are always complaining. They're like, oh, it's a coat and tie day, dad. The whole school wore coats and ties in honor of Charlie Kirk. And I understand some of you, maybe you're in your 60s, 70s, 80s, you might not have been the target audience necessarily seeing this content, but I would tell you, particularly if you have sons, grandsons, young people in your households, they may be hurting quite a bit and impacted by this far more than even you might have been. So buck that it is just a devastating yet sadly not unexpected to me event. It's a day of mourning for the whole country because of what happened within the last 24 hours. And also it is the remembrance of nine 11 today. So it's a particularly hard and emotional day. Uh, it was going to be before this horrific event happened and now we sit here with you and we, we grieve with all of you, um, because of what happened to Charlie. Um, and which is just horrific beyond words. I, I, we were in clay saw me yesterday. I was felt like I was going to throw up when we were, I was reading the initial text messages about it and we were on the, we went into commercial break at the very end of the show. Of course, I didn't want to say anything. At first, because you, this is, there are some news stories that you, you know, you just cannot get wrong. You can't. And there's so much false information out there these days. And so, so we really wanted to be just bring you the facts about this. And then I was on with will, uh, will Kane, who's been a friend of mine now for, I don't know, 15, almost 15 years. And, and we'll texted me, he said, will you please come on and talk about what's going on? And I got some, I got word when I was on the air. It was very early on in the show clay, but I had already been informed pretty reliably that Charlie wasn't going to make it. But then I, I, again, I, you know, we're dealing with the not certain, you know, you, you, obviously I can't say that if I'm not a hundred percent sure, but I'm thinking and I'm, you know, it's just all the processing, the grief, the trauma that people feel right now, we feel it, um, with you. Um, clay and I both knew and liked Charlie and had tremendous respect for what he had built and what he had done. And, and in this last election playing a critical role, uh, especially with getting that youth vote to start to see reality. And, uh, it's, it's just one of those moments clay, where you, you go to bed at night to the degree you can even sleep and it's still, you know, just doesn't feel like this could have been what happened. Uh, it's, it's so horrific. Um, and it's so wrong and evil on so many levels. I feel for, uh, Charlie's family. His wife is his two small children, mom, his dad, everybody, uh, all of his family is just, I, you know, it's, I don't know how it's possible for them to, um, even begin to deal with something like this. Um, Charlie was a force of nature. Charlie was doing really incredible work, um, and returning in a lot of ways. I think clay, the conversation back to some of our core and most important founding principles. All right, let's talk about, let's have this debate. Let's have this exchange of ideas. And I, you know, I, I know that there's this sense that, well, we're in mourning. And so should we get into the politics of this right away? Charlie was assassinated. I mean, this was a terror act. This was an assassination. This was a plan because of his politics. That's right. It's impossible not to talk about politics. That's exactly what I want to express. Thank you. Yes. It's, this wasn't a, you know, it, it would be, it would be tragic and horrible if he had, you know, died because of, you know, an armed robber who shot him or something like that. That would be horrible. That would be a terrible crime, but this was done because of who Charlie was. We all know that. In fact, the FBI, and we'll continue to, I am hopeful that there will be an arrest while we are on the air today. That's not going to bring Charlie back. And I know that this is not going to be able to comfort the, the grieving right now in a, in a meaningful way, but it will at least be the justice system beginning to do what it is possible for the justice system to do to create some accountability. I think this should be a death penalty case for the individual involved. I am hopeful that they will get this person. Uh, there's reporting that they, they have, they have the weapon uses a bolt action rifle. Uh, that is confirmed by the FBI. I watched the press conference this morning, 200 yards, perhaps 200 plus yards shot. Um, so it's somebody who had an understanding of how to, you know, they, they had some practice. This is not someone who bought a gun and then the next day went, just went on a, on a shooting spree. This is somebody who had some ability to shoot it with accuracy. Um, they're saying they think it's right now, the person, the main personal interest is college age. We'll see. I mean, they've been a lot of, you have update on what we just mentioned. I just retweeted, they have shared photos of the individual that from FBI, Salt Lake city, uh, field office. They have photos of the man that they believe, uh, is responsible for the shooting. Um, and, uh, I just retweeted those college age, as you were going to right. So they have clear video college age. I will note that there have been numerous photos of individuals of interest shared previously, including FBI statements that we have a per this is, this is where the investigative process can be a little confusing or can create some confusion, especially in the online ecosystem. A person of interest does not mean we have the person. It's exactly what it sounds like. It's, we think this is a person we definitely need to speak to. There have been a couple of those people in custody. Initially there was the, there was some crazy old guy who was saying, you know, and people thought that he had not, he did not, he was right there. He didn't have nothing to do with the shooting. Um, or, you know, it clearly wasn't him. So there's been a lot of, um, iterations of this already. So clay, yes, there's, there's video out there of this individual. The FBI has also confirmed that, uh, there are things written on the rifle. And I believe on the shell casings from this morning's press conference, which is going to be, it's going to tell us what the, we know the motivation is politics. We know this was an assassination. We might have a more direct sense, a more precise sense of what this maniac. And I agree with people say, when you say maniac, that makes it sound like a person not of their right mind. It's really just demonic. It's a demonic act to do this, to Charlie, to do this, to Charlie's family, to do this, to the American people. And one thing I can say to all of you and clay totally, I know he cosigns on this. I know that he is at the same heart and mind on this as I am. If something like this had happened to a prominent Democrat, I also would have felt sick to my stomach. I also would have said, what the heck is going on in this country? This is, this is disgusting. It is egregious. It is inhuman. And yet clay last night, I was on, I went on blue sky. Do you know about the, have you been on it? I didn't go on, but I have seen the postings. I mean, this is not a fringe part of the left. There is malignant glee over this assassination that is widely shared, um, and disgusting, but I don't want you thinking, Oh, this is, they're going to try to say, Oh, this is just an aberrational individual. This is not reflective of ideas on the left. No, there is a huge toxic foundational core of the Democrat party of the far left in this country that is celebrating political violence and assassination of people they don't like blue sky, which I do not recommend any of you download or go on, but I felt like I needed to in advance of this show. And it's honestly, it's so depraved. Um, it is a giant echo chamber of, of, um, people congratulating each other and, and cheering for what happened yesterday. It's the most appal, I mean, it, I honestly just nightmare stuff. You go and you look, what is wrong with these people? Charlie never advocated violence against anybody. Charlie, uh, never, you know, raised a hand against anyone. His whole thing was let's talk. Let's talk and, and an assassin kills him. And, and we cannot think of this as something that occurred in a vacuum clay, or, or you use the word aberrant or that, you know, that this is something. It was twice. They tried to kill Donald Trump. These are all people of the same ideology twice. They tried to kill Donald Trump. Um, now we've had people shooting up. Uh, we had the shooting up the church in Minneapolis because of radical trans ideology. We have the Nashville manifesto hidden from us because it was a radical trans terrorist. Or by the way, I don't, I don't know what the stated ideology of this person is other than it's someone who hates Trump, hates Charlie is of the left. And therefore clay is part of this. This just rotten, this, this fetid mass psychosis that Democrats think. And they can say any, you can't just run around saying people are Nazis all the time, because a lot of people think that if you could go back in time and kill Nazis, that would be a good thing. I went off doing this. I went off on this last night. Uh, and I was on with our friend, Sean Hannity in the evening. That to me is the crux of all of this. There are consequences when you say, Hey, my political opponents are Nazis. Donald Trump is Adolf Hitler. They are fascists. They're going to overthrow the government. There's not going to be an election in 2028. The guy who tried to kill Trump in West Palm beach said he was doing it because he believed Trump was Hitler. If you truly believe, and some of these crazy people do, if you truly believe that Trump is Hitler or that you're Hitler or that I'm Hitler, or that Charlie Kirk is Hitler, or all of you out there who voted for Trump or Hitler. Then don't tell me right after you kill someone or attempt to kill someone, we condemn political violence because it's a lie political violence would be justified if we were Adolf Hitler. And in their brain, some of their crazy diluted followers are taking that charge and they believe it. And they killed Charlie Kirk over it. I 100 billion percent believe, and they tried to kill Donald Trump over it. And they would try to kill you and they would try to kill me. And they would try to kill anyone that they believe is Hitlerian because they think they're a hero in their diluted mental sphere. If this Charlie was, um, we, we knew Charlie, but he was also on our, on our team, he was doing what we do, meaning clay and I, and so many others do, you know, he, he was doing a podcast and a radio show and he was spreading the truth, the truth that, so they killed him. He was killed. He, an assassin's bullet took his life because he was speaking the truth and to Clay's point, the same people cheering for this, which is, which is just monstrous. And I, and I, I had to know that it was true before I could tell you, but that is happening. A lot of people, a lot of people on the left, the psychotic, the psychosis of these people is, is really troubling for the future of this country. While, while people on the right and people voted for Trump are grieving and thinking about Charlie's poor wife and his kids and people are crying and I'm getting text messages from people. I can't sleep at night. All I can think about is Charlie's wife and his kids and what have they done to us? And then I, and then there are Democrats who are acting, we can't ignore it and we won't ignore it. We'll come back. We'll talk about this more. And we want, we'd want to take a lot of your, I know a lot of you want to weigh in and speak to us about this. You have things to get off your chest. You want to speak from your heart about this. Um, and let's, let's all discuss this together as we always do. All right, look, our sponsor here is Birch gold. Owning gold has always been a privilege. I've owned gold for a long time and it has been a sound investment, whether as a hedge against inflation or just for diversification. But Birch gold group also believes every American should own physical gold. They want to make it easy for you until September 30th. If you're a first time gold buyer, Birch gold is offering a rebate of up to $10,000 in free metals on qualifying purchases, claim eligibility and start the process. Request an info kit. Now text my name buck to 98, 98, 98 Birch gold to help you roll an existing IRA or 401k into an IRA and gold. And you're still eligible for a rebate and free metals about the $10,000 diversify with gold. Like I do from Birch gold group, make now your first time to buy gold, take advantage of a rebate of up to $10,000 when you buy by September 30th, text my name, buck B U C K to 98, 98, 98 today. Making America great again. Isn't just one man. It's many the team 47 podcast Sundays at noon Eastern in the clay and buck podcast feed, find it on the I heart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. A lot of us processing the grief, feeling like we've woken up in a somewhat different and darker country today because of this terrible act. And we wanted to speak with our, our friend, um, Bill O'Reilly. You know, him, he's a bestselling author. He was on Fox for decades and, and Bill, honestly, just wanted to give you an opportunity. We were in shock yesterday. The news came down while we were on the air at the very end of the show. So we didn't know, and we were all hoping that the, the end result would be quite different. Just, I wanted to, you, you've seen a lot in, in your years. Um, speaking the truth to the people about what's going on, but this is a awful day and I'm wanting to let you speak to everybody about how you're feeling. Okay. Well, I'm going to tell the audience on the clay and buck show, uh, the absolute truth, this was evil and, um, that word applies not only to the assassination of Mr. Kirk, but what's happening in general in this country. So as you guys know, uh, on Tuesday, my brand new book confronting evil was released and, uh, I woke up on Wednesday to see Putin, uh, firing missiles at Poland in an unbelievably dangerous situation. And then a few hours later, Charlie Kirk is shot to death in Utah. I did a lot of media between, uh, those things. And now, and, uh, one, uh, interviewer said, your book is haunting. The timing of your book is haunting because I knew that we are entering a new age of evil. And that's a point I made on news nation on television last night, 1930s, the world gravitated toward evil in an enormous way that resulted in a hundred million people being killed in world war II. Now, thanks to the United States, we defeated evil and there were others who helped us, but we were the primary motivator. We're back now in an age where evil is on the rise and evil is what took Charlie Kirk's life. So I find myself in a very interesting position of having written a book. Uh, you know, we start these a year in advance predicting that bad things were going to occur and then see them occur at the very week my book is released and, uh, the message in confronting evil is the reason this is happening is because many Americans and all people all over the world are turning away. So if you turn away from evil, you're going to get more of it. It is easier for miscreants to do their horrible deeds now than it ever before in American history. Do you guys realize that it is easier to kill a fellow human being in the United States than ever before because of our permissive justice system and our progressive movement that does not want to punish criminals. And indeed encourages political violence. There are members of the progressive movement and they are centered on MSNBC and the urban newspapers who are encouraging political violence. We saw that yesterday, just one hour after Charlie Kirk was shot, a man named Matthew Dowd went on MSNBC and said, you know, it might've been Kirk's fault because of his opinions. Now he was fired because MSNBC had to fire him. But is anybody surprised? Is anybody surprised that that was said on MSNBC? No, because it's a cauldron of hatred. We'll play some of that audio for you guys out there. Um, cause I do think it's important for you to be aware of what was said, uh, uh, and has been said, uh, Bill O'Reilly with us now. What advice? Um, one of the things obviously we're doing on the show today is a form of collective healing and mourning. Um, because so many people have been so deeply impacted, including us, including you, what should we do? Um, because there's a lot of people out there in your opinion, what is the constructive path going forward in the wake of Charlie Kirk's assassination? It's an excellent question you're asking. So Mr. Kirk's death, I think is going to lead to a renaissance of a demand for justice. That's what I believe is going to happen. But in order for that to happen, you have to understand what is happening in this world right now. And that's why I wrote confronting evil, because most people look away. They don't understand. They don't know what happened. Every one of the 15 miscreants profiled in evil. My book is relevant to today. As far back as Caligula in the Roman empire, it's all relevant to today, but this is so shocking, so disconcerting, so sad. The assassination of a 31 year old, just exercising his freedom of speech with two young children and a wife that everybody is forced to pay attention. And now you have to inform yourself. So you guys might know that earlier this week on the launch of confronting evil, I made a very bold statement that the progressives, of course, attacked. My statement was, if you live in New York city and you vote for man, Donnie, you are committing an act of evil. Doesn't mean you're an evil person. It means that vote is evil because man Donnie has told you just like Hitler did in the 1920s, I'm not comparing Hitler to man Donnie, but it's the same kind of presentation of what they believe. Man Donnie has told you he does not want to imprison criminals. He'll let out as many as he can. Well, that is going to lead to more murder, more rape, more assault. He's not hiding it. There's no two sides to it. He said it. So you are voting for that. If you pull the lever for the man, and I'm saying to the American public, you have to stop that. You can't enable these people in Charlotte where the judge let this guy out, knowing the man was violent, knowing he had beat up his own sister, let him out to do what he did to that young woman on the bus, every American has got to say, no, we're not voting for that. Judge should be removed. The fact that she isn't removed, I think she will be. What are you, what are you doing in North Carolina? What are you doing? Same thing in Chicago, South side, 20 years, 20 years of drug gangs, mowing down poor black citizens, and you object to a layer of protection offered by the federal government to stop it, or at least mitigate it. You object to that? What the deuce is going on? So Americans have got to get as angry as you guys, as me in order to make Charlie Kirk's death a legacy play. So when people die in this violent manner, if something good can emerge that prevents future deaths, that is very important. Bill, can I ask you, um, the. I don't think you're on blue sky. I'm I'm, I felt obligated because I was going to talk about this. Cause I saw people saying, you will not believe how much vile and just disgraceful celebration was going on on this website, which is the, it's like the left-wing lunatic version of X because they, they can't, you know, control X anymore because of Elon. So there's this whole place you just go. And Bill, I was going through it last night. Do you think Democ, and it was as bad as everybody was saying, uh, I can, I can tell everybody, uh, it was, it's horrific. Do you think that there is any sense from some of the Democrats who matter? Some of the Democrats who have power within their party, that there is something deeply, spiritually, psychologically wrong with the base of their party, I mean, do you get that sense that there's any accountability from within their side, or is this just going to be a both sides ism? And, and some people are going to celebrate it on their team and other people are going to ignore it. How do you see that where we are right now? Only the mentally ill would celebrate the assassination of Charlie Kirk. So these people who are doing that are mentally ill, whether they're a danger to society, I don't know, but that's the classification. 100% of them fall into. There's no excuse for that. Now on the democratic party front, you are seeing today a total retreat from Trump is Hitler from, uh, MAGA or horrible human beings. You're seeing a hundred percent retreat because if you are on the hill or in a state office, you are not going to be able to survive by peddling hate in the wake of Charlie Kirk's assassination. You will not be able to survive it. Okay. They all know that. I mean, the view today came on, and this is a very good example because everybody knows what the view is. All right. And these are radical left women. These are not thinkers. These are people who are in business to, uh, make the other side suffer. All of them were lamenting the death of Charlie Kirk. Disney would not tolerate it. And they saw what happened to Matthew Dowd at MSNBC. But was Charlie Kirk ever invited on a program? No. Okay. No, we've talked, we've talked about this bill. We've it's one of the, one of the things that I think Charlie did so well, Bill, and this is something that I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about is how do you cut through the noise to make people hear arguments that are good and sound that they otherwise would not have been exposed to, because this is one of the downsides in a huge way. I think of the algorithmic culture we have built. They only feed you things that they know you already like. So it puts people into the, uh, into the atmosphere, into the zeitgeist only for things that they've already experienced. This is my old man take bill. I bet you'll agree with this. The reason I love reading print newspapers is because I come across stories that I otherwise would have never seen because the algorithm wouldn't have known that I might be interested in that. And that hopefully opens my mind and makes me better at analyzing arguments and stories than I otherwise would be. How do you cut through? Cause your point there, they wouldn't have him on the view because his arguments are too good and because some people sitting in that audience might have said, wait a minute, I've heard that this Charlie Kirk guy's a Nazi. I've heard he's Hitler, but he's actually a pretty reasonable dad. And some of his takes, I might not agree with them all. You shouldn't necessarily agree with everything anybody says, uh, entirely. Some of his takes, they might've opened the window too. And that's what was happening on social media. And that's why they killed him. The corporations, Disney, Comcast, CBS are partially responsible for the rise in hatred in this country. I'm not going to say the rise in evil, but the rise in hatred, which feeds right into evil and then evil feeds into violence, the corporations make money. Allowing people like Joy Behar and the others to peddle hate. Yeah. Okay. They make money from Colbert. Although they say they lose money. Why was he on for so long? That's all he did. Now that is going to cease for a while. And my book is, is, is a perfect example of if you want to inform yourself about evil, if you really want to know what it is, you read this book and then you will know, and then hopefully you yourself will start to combat it in your own neighborhood, in your own family, in your own state, because that's what it will take a shift in the culture, the American culture, you know, I'm gonna, I was invited by president Trump to Yankee stadium tonight. Uh, there's a reason that he invited me. This isn't a social thing. I think it's about Putin, but I'm not quite sure. But you guys know that I have a pretty, uh, let's say respectful relationship with Mr. Trump. Uh, I know I'm going to be talking about this culture situation cause he brought it up yesterday in his overall office reaction to Charlie Kirk, and I'm, I'm going to hand them the book. I'm going to say, listen, you cannot look away from evil. You got to deal with Putin. You got to deal with them. Now you got to deal with the Jihad, Iran. You already get, you already know that evil. All right. You neutralize them. And now you have to turn your attention to American culture to call these people out enough's enough. I've had it. You guys have had it. And Charlie Kirk is dead because of it. An evil person killed him and we are looking away from evil. That's it. Bill O'Reilly confronting evil as the book bill. Appreciate you as always, sir, for the clarity and, and what you stand for here now and always. So thank you for being with us. Thanks for having me guys. We know evil does exist in this world and, uh, we have to do what we can to stand against it in every way that we can. You want to make sure that you also are able to defend yourself when you can, how you can, and this is where saber comes into the picture sabers, pepper sprays, pepper gels, projectile devices, all made here in the USA. Look, I was talking to my wife last night about home defense, home protection. And we have saber non-lethal here. We have a lot of lethal stuff here too, but we have saber non-lethal because I can trust them. Carrie's comfortable with it. You have to take your defense into your own hands. There's just evil out there. You know it. We know it. All of us are aware. Saber is spelled S A B R E. The website is saber radio.com. You can say 15% when you go to that website today, the mega bundle, which has a pepper projectile launcher is there for you. It's a great way to start. I've got one here at home. Clay's got one, but being able to defend yourself is critical. Visit saber radio.com. That's S A B R E radio.com or call 844-824-SAFE 844-824-SAFE. Stories of freedom, stories of America, inspirational stories that unite us all each day, spend time with Clay and Buck, find them on the free iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back in Clay Travis, Buck Sexton show. There is a press conference that is coming soon that we will take live. We are going to be joined by Senator Bill Hagerty here in a moment, but I wanted you to be able to hear that last caller talking about the impact that Charlie Kirk had had on her teenager. Um, and I also want to tell you, look, um, there's probably a lot of you that are going to be looking for something that is not serious and, uh, and I'm one of them, I'm going to be going to a ninth grade football game this afternoon. And then I'm headed to Knoxville to go watch Tennessee play Georgia. And a lot of you want to play along with prize picks. I give you a pick every Thursday. I'm going to give it to you right now. Travis Kelsey, more than one half receiving yards, a free square. Nobody can lose this one. Not even Buck, uh, Derek Henry, more than one half rushing and receiving touchdown and Jaden Daniels, more than one half touchdown pass up at clayandbuck.com. We give you a pick every Thursday for NFL action. Uh, we've been doing this for a few years that pays out at five to one. You get 50 bucks. When you go to prizepicks.com use code clay, that's prizepicks.com code clay. Uh, Senator Bill Hagerty, uh, with us right now, Senator. Uh, I know you pretty well. Um, I know you've got, I think four kids and I bet your sons in particular have been influenced and impacted in a significant way by Charlie Kirk. Like mine have. In fact, our kids have gone to one of the same schools. I don't know if you know this, uh, Senator, but the kids at, uh, at our kids' mutual school all wore jackets and ties, which they are not fond of doing in honor of Charlie Kirk today, basically the entire school, what was your reaction when you saw and heard what had happened, what should happen next? Well, um, I I've known Charlie for, for years. Um, I wasn't close with Charlie to the extent, you know, never took a vacation or something like that. But when we'd see one another in a room, we'd always make our way across to shake hands. How are you doing? I was thinking the last time I saw Charlie was at Montelago not too long ago, um, but it just, you know, as a parent, it just strikes deep, not only the influence on my sons. Uh, and I tell you, my sons share, uh, something with Charlie as well. My boys are both Eagle Scouts as am I. So was Charlie was an Eagle Scout. And, uh, Charlie's a little bit older than my sons, but, um, you know, I have a very parental view of young people like Charlie who are willing to enter the fray, uh, to be the man in the arena, so to speak, and to, to step up and engage in debate and, and, and basically bring out what's best in America. That's the freedom of speech that we have that no other nation enjoys. And to see that curtailed in such a tragic way is heartbreaking to me. It's just heartbreaking. Senator Hagerty appreciate you being here. And it's a tough day, um, for the whole country that we were prepared to have a remembrance of nine 11. Um, and then this terrible incident, uh, became something that it's just, uh, so many of us couldn't sleep well last night, thinking about it, the grief that has spread across the country. What, what would you say to everybody right now, especially to a lot of, I mean, you have, you have young boys yourself, uh, to the parents out there who are worried about how this is going to affect their S their sons and daughters who looked up to Charlie. Well, I don't think this should impact the degree to which they look up to Charlie at all. Um, in fact, I think this is going to, to, to raise the respect for Charlie and, and, and raise the attention level in a way that is well-deserved, but sad at the same time. Um, Charlie certainly didn't aim to be a martyr, but he has been pushing for a cause. It's been vitally important to him. I think it's vitally important to our nation and his willingness to engage, to debate and to clarify for young people. So they could actually see the truth and cut through the noise that you spend time. Clay Buck, you both spend time, uh, cutting through the noise in the mainstream media, the opposite obfuscation that takes place, the politicization that takes place place in the media, the silencing that takes place. Um, Charlie was, was a beacon when it comes to standing up and bringing the truth to light and enabling a real discussion about issues rather than just spin, spin, spin all day long. Uh, Charlie was willing to engage. He was willing to listen to different opinions. He was willing to, to, to argue in public in a respectful manner. Uh, this is the way our forefathers, our founding fathers designed this nation, uh, to respect and support just that type of interaction. And what happened, uh, was an act of cowardice first and foremost, only a total coward would do something like that. And someone with such a narrow mind that they think the only way to address a difference of opinion is to shut the other side down as a manifestation of what's gone so deeply wrong with the whole cancel culture here in America. And anyone, and I, I'm sad to say it, but there are people that are actually trying to justify this or in some way, even celebrating this, that dehumanizes, uh, not only those of us that care, that have heavy feelings, it dehumanizes the person that could possibly think that way. And we need to get back to, to the, to the basics here in America. We need to get back to fundamental respect. And again, it's heartbreaking to see what's happening at what has happened, I should say with Charlie's loss, but I hope that it'll be a chance for America to wake up for our young people to wake up and say this young man, um, stood for something quite important and I think he's going to live on in our memories for, for years and decades to come. We're talking to Senator bill Hagerty of Tennessee. Um, this is happening all over the country, sadly, but it happened where you and I happened to both live in, in Tennessee, a middle Tennessee state university Dean, uh, and I know there's a lot of different deans, a student affiliated Dean celebrated, uh, the death of Charlie Kirk, uh, MTSU, the college has, uh, terminated that person. Uh, and they are no longer employed by the university, but sadly Buck and I have been talking about this Senator. It's one thing to disagree politically. It's entirely a different thing when someone is assassinated to celebrate the assassination, which we are seeing take place all over the place, including sometimes at public universities. Um, how do we restore the soul of the nation? It's a big question, but I'm incredibly troubled. Buck is too. Uh, it's indefensible. The reactions we are seeing what should happen. What can we do to restore that soul? Well, the particular incident that you're describing, uh, was, was, was extraordinarily disturbing to me. And I know it was to you and everybody else. Middle Tennessee state university is by, by population, by student population, the largest university in the state of Tennessee, a population that's a state with over 7 million people. MTSU is our largest, uh, our largest, um, college and to have the, I think it was an assistant Dean of, of, um, student services or Dean of students make a statement that in any way, in any manner could be interpreted as celebrating it as showing zero sympathy. I think is a direct quote from what I saw in the person's communicate. What a terrible message that sends the students that you're supposed to be there to support and, and, and teach. Um, if that's the type of indoctrination and teaching that's going on, something is sadly failed. And I applaud Dr. Sidney McPhee and the leadership there at MTSU for dealing with this right away. Um, I'm friends with most of the number of the members of the boards of that, the board of directors, but that university, I know that they would have poured this sort of thing. Uh, and these rogue faculty members, and there's no other way to describe it. Uh, people that are in a position of responsibility and trust with respect to our young people, particularly the audience that, that, uh, Charlie was so good at reaching and touching, uh, for, for, for someone like that to step up and say what they did is, is a point. And I'm thankful that MTSU acted swiftly to discharge them. Senator Hagerty. We appreciate you make the time for us, sir. God bless you and your family and, and, uh, your children. Thanks for being here. As always. Thank you for having me. That's Senator bill Hagerty. It does great work, uh, for the state of Tennessee. Uh, we'll come back. There were reports that there might be a press conference just to update some of you. It now appears Buck, there may not be a press conference, so we're unsure exactly, uh, what is going to happen, but obviously we're going to continue to update you. And if it doesn't happen, um, then, uh, then we will certainly, uh, Sean Hannity, I'm sure we'll be following this story on many of different stations that you are all listening, um, on right now with all of us, but I want to tell you, uh, having your identity stolen online, it's a real thing happens to tens of millions of Americans every year happens most often when a cyber hacker breaks into a company's database and steals customer data. That could be names, addresses, credit cards, birth dates, even social security numbers. It's important to understand how cyber crime and identity theft are affecting our lives. You want LifeLock's online identity theft protection. It's the best defense out there. And if you do become a victim of identity theft and you're a LifeLock member, you can rely on dedicated us-based restoration specialists at LifeLock that will work with you to help fix it guaranteed or your money back. Become a LifeLock member. If you aren't already joined now, save 40% off your first year with promo code call 1-800-LIFELOCK or go online to lifelock.com. My name Clay as the promo code for 40% off terms apply. That's lifelock.com. My name. Clay want to be in the know when you're on the go, the team 47 podcast Trump highlights from the week Sundays at noon Eastern in the clan, but podcast feed, find it on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back in Clay, Travis Buck Sexton show. Um, Ali producer shared a email with us and I thought that I would, uh, share this with all of you. Um, Clay and Buck I'm reaching out, uh, because my son, I won't say his name, but, uh, know that we are talking to you help start a Cape Cod chapter of turning point USA a couple of years ago. He's home today, somewhat broken, trying to process what happened. He's only 20 years old. My son's been inspired by Charlie Kirk since he was a little kid. He now works for leadership Institute, spends endless hours, recruiting students at colleges all over the Northeast. Um, I want to see if there's a way that you could possibly speak to him today. I think good therapy for him would be to speak about Charlie Kirk. He's alone in his room right now. I'm trying to think of a way to help him get inspired, lift his spirits. Um, anything you can do would be greatly appreciated. Um, so I'm, I don't want to call this kid. I want to put him on that, talk to millions of people, but Buck, I think you and I, they can clip this and they can share with them and you're hearing my voice because I think there's so many young kids out there, so many young boys and Charlie was for them a voice to help provide salvation to them. That's why he connected so well with young men, young boys. And I know in my own household that just from talking to my kids about the impact, my, my ninth grade son said, dad, we went in the locker room and the whole football team was just crushed. My son, one of my sons last night when I was talking to him said, do you think Charlie's kids are going to grow up and watch that video of him getting shot one day? What do you say to that? And so what, what I would say, what I told them and what I would tell that kid is you have to be tougher than you think you are. If you have to be brave, then you think you, and you are both. And so are all of us. And I think for young kids in particular, you may not have experienced. And I know for you, buck, I could see it in your eyes because this is the first time something like this has happened since you became a dad and it changes you in a big way, but what I would say is everybody has to lift up and be braver and more courageous and stronger than you think you are. And I think when you're a young kid, young boy, young girl, you feel like you're fragile and you aren't, you are so much stronger than you think you are. And one of the things with this whole toxic empathy universe is we're telling kids, Hey, you're weak. Words hurt you. You need to be protected from the real world. That guy who killed Charlie, he was weak. There was an open mic right there. If you have the best argument in the world, Charlie was providing you a voice to step right up and tell him why he was wrong. And instead of that from 200 yards away, you took his life for your young son, for so many young people out there. And for a lot of us that are older too, we have to be braver. We have to be more courageous. We have to be tougher than we even think we are. And you cannot let people who want to silence you win ever. That's what they want. You have to stand up stronger than you've ever been before. All of us do. Your son, my sons, everybody, sons and daughters, and all of us to have to be the rocks to allow them to stand up and be strong. Amen, Clay. Let's take, let's take calls in the night. Let's come back. Let's hear from all of you. Our lines are open. We want to speak with all of you. So, um, please call in. And if you're getting a busy, please wait your turn. If you want to speak to us and everyone all around the country about what happened. We'll get into it in a few minutes here. Thank you for being with us. All right. We're closing up shop today here on Clay and Buck. Um, look, it was a difficult show for all of us. I'm sure it was difficult for you to be with us and thinking about these things, but, uh, we're honored and appreciated that you were with us. And, uh, it is a very special thing that Clay and I get to do with all of you every day. Um, and we, uh, you know, we are going to do our best to continue with the, uh, with the East ethos and the mission of this show, which, uh, aligned, uh, in lockstep with what Charlie wanted for this country and, and with what he stood for, um, we have that interview where he joined our show because of course it was a friend of the show, friend of ours. He came on, I was on vacation, but he was able to speak to Clay about a whole range of things, something very important to Charlie. And as we see critical now in America, uh, to have our focus is how we are raising and how we are encouraging and, and building young men up for the next step to be the next generation of male leadership in this critical, um, country of ours, this, uh, Republic that is the last best guarantor of freedom for, for all of us, um, here is, uh, cut nine, Charlie, we're just going to let you listen to what he had to say about it. So you speaking of college football, a lot of young men are college football fans, the campaign that was just run. If you had to point to one group that moved most massively from plus 14 for Biden to plus 14 for Trump, according to at least one wall street journal poll that I saw, why did young men in your mind, people that you have been reaching out to aggressively move so substantially in this election? I'd say, I think it's because they want to be part of a political movement that doesn't hate them. Um, over the last couple of years, you started to see the woke stuff that was really incubated in 2020, uh, start to germinate and metastasize and grow into all of our institutions. And one of the core orthodoxies of woke is what we call DEI is really a hatred of Christian white, straight men. And I hate to be that blunt about it, but it is, it's at the, it's the orthodox of it, the orthodoxy of it. And young men say, wait, why, why am I being part of this? Exactly. I want to be part of a political movement that at least acknowledges that there is men and women and says that it's a good thing to be a man. And that masculinity is not inherently toxic. And I think top of that though, go ahead, please. Yeah, no, I was just going to say, I think what's interesting and you may have been going there too, is it starts with white men are the problem. But the problem with that is eventually it has to grow. And I think black guys, Hispanic guys, Asian guys looking around like, Hey, I don't think masculinity is toxic. I think that men and women are different. And suddenly you can't say that and be a Democrat. Correct. And then, and then it even grows deeper into this kind of tyranny of political correctness, which at its core is like toxic femininity, which is that we're going to police all of your speech. The left has become a bunch of scolds of hall monitors, of people that do not believe in free expression or dialogue or discourse. And, um, you know, what we've seen in the last, um, couple of years is now a backlash of that, where if there is anyone in the quote unquote, Manistere, um, you know, you say Joe Rogan, the Theo Vaughn, it's not that they're conservative, but they're inherently anti-left that they're against the kind of new left-wing dogma and doctrine that, um, believes that there needs to be speech codes that, you know, this trans nonsense. And so young men in particular kind of led the rebellion towards a political movement, one rooted in common sense, uh, patriotism, liberty, and freedom. Clay. Um, I spoke at one of Charlie's very first events for turning point. Uh, I don't, I don't know what number it was in the progression, but it was 20. I think it was 2015. Um, so maybe early 2016. And I remember something, he came up to me backstage and this is our first ever meeting. And I didn't know anything about him. All I knew is that he had reached out and he said, I love your stuff. Would you please come? And Tommy Lahren was there and I was there and he said, I love your stuff. Would you please come and speak? And I said, sure. You know, I was, I happened to, it was in Dallas. I happened to be in Dallas and he saw me backstage and he had that already, of course, that Charlie energy and just, uh, you know, you, this guy was just pulling it all together and he came up to me and he said, you know, I listened to you fill in for rush because this is after I'd filled in for rush a few times as a, as a guest host, you know, Charlie filled in on, on my program years later, uh, when I was doing a six to nine, so now Jesse Kelly slot. So I, Charlie filled in for me. Um, but he said, I listened to you for rush. And he said, you know, he was very generous. He said, you know, you did such a great job. Um, and, and that's, and basically it was like, that's just so cool. Like he was just telling me that's so cool. You filled in for rush. And he said, you know how I learned conservatism? He said the one thing that he absolutely never missed, and this is, I think for a lot of you bringing things full circle, he said, I couldn't always listen to all three hours, but I listened to Rush Limbaugh's opening monologue every day, starting in, you know, junior high, every day, he said, you listen to rush. So this is so much of Charlie and what he believed it, it makes sense. And you understand where it was coming from. Well, I think that's, that's a really great analogy because what it represents is all of us have a relatively short amount of time on this planet, right? We don't know when it's going to come to an end for any of us. And I think Charlie got that. He's only 31 and rush certainly got that. There are tons of you listening to us right now who started listening. Cause mom and dad, grandma and grandpa were driving you around in the car. The rush baby, uh, universe is large and we've now been doing this show for over four years, which means you could have gone from freshman year of high school to being a senior now, um, and we're going to be doing it for hopefully years and years to come, but you win by winning the culture. And that's what I would come back to with Charlie. You have to go to people where they are. And he went to them on a college campus and he said, here's an open mic let's debate. And the very foundation of America is the best argument should win. And Charlie had the best arguments and he won and he won big. And the culture has shifted around him and that's why they killed him. And what we cannot allow to happen, not you, me, not all of you out there. What we cannot allow to happen is for his victories to go in vain. We have to pick up the mantle and we have to advance it further and further. And I know all of you are going to do that. I was going to say, Clay and I make you all a solemn promise. We will continue what we do here. We'll continue to honor what Charlie stood for in his memory. And we will stay in this fight because it's a fight to make this the best country for all of us that we possibly can. And to tell you all the truth and you all play a role in it, play a critical part in it every day because without you, we wouldn't be able to have any impact. So thank you all for listening. God bless you. We're praying for all of you. We're praying for Charlie, Charlie's family. Uh, we love you all. And please go hug and tell your family you love them today. This is an I heart podcast.