regarding the security

situation, first of all thank you everyone in the room here for sticking around in the midst of the disruption there. i appreciate you sticking with us as we assess

the bottom of the situation but because you are here and because of the situation i want to make everyone aware of the facts that we have received and why the floor was cleared. obviously the security situation here we've been on top of working with the police, the metropolitan police department here in dc and also with our private security team and hotel security . our top concern here has been the safety of our speakers, our attendees who flown in from around the country. that has continued to be our top concern. i want to thank right now our private security team, metropolitan police department, montgomery police department, hotel security staff, everyone . it was a team effort that responded to the threat wereceived .

[applause] so i want to thank them for their professionalism and the hotel's decision to evacuate this floor was not made lightly. it was done on the basis of credible evidence we had received so since you're here in the room i want to make you known of the facts as we have them. and rico tarrio, the first security incident was reported that henrique tarrio was head of the proud boys and recently sentenced for seditious conspiracy to 22 years in federal prison and was pardoned by donald trump. he was here yesterday after having been arrested at the capital the day before for assaulting an individual, was here harassing terry dunn who is here, the capital police

we responded to that in the evening upping our security measures with our private security team for the final day today. today security concern started at 12:15 p.m. when principals first received an email from an individual, from an account claiming to be henrique t.. it was a credible bomb threat for five bite bombs, three different locations that were named in the email. and it was to honor the j6 hostages recently released by emperor trump, those were the first words in the emailsubject title explosive surprises. so we responded, took that seriously obviously . we responded and evacuated this room. i should say we haven't confirmed obviously will

precisely sent the email . the investigative teams here in washington are working on that and will get to the bottom of it. we will work with them and make everything available to them so that they can track down who was responsible for this and hold them to account but i want to say this . it's like i said yesterday, we are not going to be cowed. we are not going to bed now rd. this type of threat to the physical safety of us, members of congress, this is a real problem in the united states of america and it isn't going tostand . [applause] and you know it's

a credit to everyone here in this room who is a part of principals first to come and not leave this building and we knew it was safe but it would have been easy to go home and write that off and let these threats win but this is what america is all about and america's democracy, the way our government works not be cowed by threats like this or by people like this . we will get to the bottom of this was . i want to say thank you, we're going to continue this summit and bring it to a successful conclusion. this summit has been our largest ever and it's the first one where we received bomb threats so we must be doing something right and speaking about things that matter to the american people . >> ..

[applause] [cheering] good afternoon. my name is lynn schmidt i am from the show me state of missouri. this is my fifth and i am very, very pleased to come back to the stage, after lunch, and welcome lieutenant governor jeff duncan and michael wood. lieutenant governor duncan was a 12 lieutenant governor for the state of georgia. he also served as a member of the georgia house of representatives. he has a husband, a father of three. i just learned he was drafted

from georgia tech to the marlins and was a picture in minor leagues for six years. so that is fun. michael wood is a marine combat veteran, small business owner and was a political candidate. so, please welcome to the stage lieutenant governor jeff duncan and michael wood. [applause] [cheering] cox all right, is this on? test, test. so, i knew just spoke it can't resist but i am like belief that these people. turns out if you let a bunch of sedition us out of jail, bad

things are going to happen maga brown shirts or whatnot, tried their street violence. i don't care if they're above the law which essentially they are because they got the pardon right there. i am not going to stop talking. i hope you do not stop talking. and tim miller yesterday was talking about how we should not be afraid to talk about politics. and it is insane that in the united states of america it even has to be said out loud. i am not going to be afraid too. i am not afraid today we are going to keep talking politics i'm glad that you are here with us. [applause] i have a special place in my heart for republican member of the gop who endorsed kamala harris, vice president harris this past election. and it took courage. it is not easy going against her

tribe. i'm not going to mention any names appears pretty disappointed a lot of other republicans who i note knew better. even if they could not endorse a trump they still wanted to keep their hands clean bite not going the next logical step. the only step to support the democrats. the person next to me did not do that. he supported a democrat. he was so impressed whenever i saw him in pennsylvania campaigning for the vice president not to just put up statement but go and talk to people in the swing states. >> call me jeff please for me conversation leading up was set on the sidelines don't endure it get if you don't like donald trump i get you think is dangerous. i get it that you're really worried about his leadership cells have been behind the curtain with the mute help to make the shallow dumb decisions that are reckless, all of that.

just sit on the silence and don't endorse anybody as i sat there would look at my three kids and realize i am in a position of influence. people are watching what we're doing and how we are doing cannot imagine sitting on the sidelines and not doing something not doing something met a lot of different things to me this past election cycle supported nikki haley. supporting anybody but donald trump for most of the republican primary when it became inevitable i entertained the idea of running in the no labels category and have some conversations there. that it looked up and said i do not want to sit on the sidelines and watch donald trump when this and think i was just a coward to not stand up and do the right thing. that's why first injured endorse joe biden and then endorsed kamala harris but looking back although we did not win the election, i would not change a thing. quick sewer in the state house. obsolete you are lieutenant governor but was the reaction of the republican circles not just the elected but the donors and

those runs in republican lands did you get blowback? you talked about your son at the dnc what was it like after you made that decision? proximity of publix princess or continue to experience this. a group setting is a visceral reaction from republicans or conservatives in general. it's groupthink takes over. the highest state lied officials community elected officials went on when the very supportive. i go to an easement trained rocky week i get it we cannot politics but in group settings they are not. the most common thing that happens the former colleague elected the close on their like you're doing the right thing. i appreciate you saying that one on one. but look, this is what it is. i do not like in reality you do

not like waking up and reading the wall street journal and sing all the reckless things going on domestically and internationally just based upon a hothead. but that is the reality we are dealing with have got to figure out ways to work with reality. we think about the midterms or eight campaign for president. we need to think about how we represent state representatives and county commissioners. you reap a reward behavior that embarrasses people and demeans it people does not put row plans in place? do we reward people that love the sound of broken glass but not solutions? if that is what this comes to we will continue to get this over and over and over again. so, what i don't understand, if you are in congress or in some sort of public office, i don't understand why these guys hold onto it so much and why they are so afraid to upset people.

you have been elected to many things over the years. what exactly are these devoutly justified in walmarts and was going to come up and yell at them? he'd like your it's under earn congress or something you lose an election that stings a little bit by ensuring that a pretty good job after that. i'm sure you can do other things are they really afraid to be yelled at by the neighbors? i would say this well before the 2020 debacle is not a politician you heard i was a baseball player of all things did not make any money begun to spend six years in the minor leagues is awesome. probably played in half of yours home count for our there was also my wife didn't think she is very awesome. i got into politics out of nowhere. it's amazing to me and he first walked in the room would realize a majority people in their mind, that was the most important thing they've ever done. will have something in her mind the most important thing we've ever done. for me, it is my family.

i would do anything for my family wife got my three kids give it up jobs, i'm giving up the hot seat and politics. but most people in the wake of the most important thing they have done as being in elected office. giving them a taste of power with its big horse small given opportunity sit in the front rope hang out the rich and famous, given them the opportunity to do all the stuff. they will do anything to protected him to say sync pulseo the 22 election was rigged. even if it means excellent donald trump is a strong leader. even it means patting weimer put it on the back instead of supporting ukraine. even if it means parting generally sixth criminals. they will do anything to maintain that spot. that is sad. but that is reality. mentally's gross moments for us. is that care about democracy, care about the future of this country for the right reasons but we cannot complain about relative at the deals reality.

and that to me means being intellectually honest. it's not just enough to point fingers and say donald trump sucks because guess what, he does. it's not just enough to see the threat to democracy they don't really believe you. i'm so we have to be tactical and strategic and we talk about it make sure people intellectually honest. because at the end of the date that's what makes is good at our jobs. it makes us good at being a parent into luxury honest. not saying what's popular but what's important. so think it's interesting to write a column every few weeks for the constitution. it takes me forever to write these things because that is just not my forte but my wife is still amazed i produce something with seven or 800 words in it, but whatever. for networks. it takes like five days i love it and more satisfied when i get done. my kids can start to talk to me get into doing some research for the next article that i'm writing and it is interesting the support for donald trump's 50 plus% of americans as a part

donald trump 80 plus% in support donald trump it's mind blowing but it is what it is. when you ask than the individual issues like for example do you think di was the reason for the plane crash? note 93% per we asked the question should he have releases generally sixth you go down the list. should you turn your back on ukraine? individual people don't support their doing. that is reality. that is the conversation you need to have with your neighbors. the people in your community just encourage them to be intellectually honest. long answer for your question. quickset was great, that was great. on that note being intellectually honest i'm a conservative, you are a conservative i used to be a problem i don't know what you are these days. is there anything you're seeingf the trump administration you're like i hate the guy he's in slb i get all of that.

that's kind of work in my old conservative muscles. because i am seeing things that maybe 10 years ago i could see myself getting excited about. it's all through like a carnival weird fun house mere. it's all being done in the worst way possible. we do have two people working for the federal government, i am sure. the best way to go about it? absolutely not. it is you think you're seeing i might be able to get behind that? what's the first part of what you were talking about. right now for the next three years i'm comfortable calling myself an american. [applause] an american that cares about the future of this country across all divides. i'm conservative by nature i think a lot of the countries conservative by neighbor nature i don't think calling someone a name solves a problem. and so working through the details, details do matter. as far as conservative ideas i think the trump administration

has a lot of the lines right you name them. if any business what to do a restructuring project like this it would take enough time and common sense they would not worry about the headlines they were about the results. the result to be better more effective you broke out down the team and analyze each agency ane shrinkage would look like. instead a son about the actual result. it's about the headline. some of this stuff is all about one tweet. it's one news cycle parts changing and shifting. so yes, i do think the federal government is too big. i said that as an american i think all americans should be concerned to think our debt is headed in the wrong direction. all all americans should be concerned. i think doge on its surface is partially able to go in and help. but not the way they are doing it ending the war between ukraine and russia is a great

noble task. we should all pump that part know when she went lives to be lost but not the peril of turning our backs on ukraine and handing the keys to europe that makes no sense. [applause] >> the previous question intellectual honesty none of it makes sense. until we the people start digging in. so we the people start caring about stuff will continue to see this go over and over and over again. it concerns me with things like the economy. nothing gets america's attention more than the economy. i'm really, really worried about the economy little bit of a nerd and pay attention and tells him of the smart money, the big money the real money is worried about inflation. being a continued growth for you. i worry about the chaos in the markets. this a lot of things i worry about. i don't worry about that from a political standpoint and really

care about politics i care about that as a business or care about that as a father. i care about that as somebody who wants to retire in a respectful period of time. democrats independence all of us. a few years ago he wrote a book called gop 2.0. the next republican party after mecca, how is that going? thanks for the question. it still 288 pages of it being truth. i talk a lot about in the book what i call my pet project of policy, empathy and tone. i want to thank them when i release the book to give me the opportunity to launch the book to the world. it was a thought or impulsive, empathy and tone for democrat republican independent wherever you are if you elected people they want on the merits of the policy that they stood for.

just imagine what america it would look like if we had leaders in place. use empathy to understand the other side. not because you want to give in because when you truly understand the other side's opinion, it makes a better decision-maker. use a tone that invites and encourages. pet project, i am hopeful but i'm not optimistic to see it play out for a lot of things i talk about in the book with things i test drove in the georgia senate when i got elected in 2012, got sworn in in 2013 as a state representative, i knew nothing. i knew why i was conservative i did not understand the mechanics. i woke up a few years into my term as a state representative, i was like director of unimportant stuff of the capitol. i had a couple big bills that i passed based upon some rural hospitals i always thought there's a better way to do this. right for the job of lieutenant governor because in georgia at the lieutenant governor estes at

the temple for the legislature. he picked the bills that come forward. he picked the committees and the chairs it's actually really important job for 40 legislative days out of the year. my thought was on when to test drive this theory you can be conservative but not angry. and so i would do things like go meet with the democratic caucus before we bring a bill forward and say here's a bill, i get you guys are digging against it. is there anything we could do to the bill to soften the edges to bring it back into the fold? almost every time there's something inconsequential because of the state level were not dealing with the federal game that's being played. watching at work, watching the relationships the fact that bipartisan legislation gets voted on and passed is always a higher quality legislation than a partisan vote. it just is. and i watch that. for the four years as lieutenant governor in georgia wit especially fun time for this for years we had the pandemic like everybody else with the

additional civil unrest that played out we watched importance of working across party lines we had the 2020 election debacle is grateful of governor kemp and others were able to join up and dig in. [applause] gop 2.0 is helpful. i don't know if the republican party is recoverable i really truly do not know. i say that as i stand here as an american. the gop decide to kick me out the first question asked was what took so long? all they care about it donald trump they don't care about voters or citizens. i don't know what happens. the smartest genius ever ends up pulling the rabbit out of a hat, all this goes well the economy is strong in the world is super peaceful then maga is going to be thing forever for it or at least my political lifetime.

my guess is that a majority of americans will grow tired of his games and circuit should over the puck is going were going to look up at the midterms, the four ear cycle will see an american that's fiscally conservative. and hopefully have got a party quite honest of the time i spent on the campaign trail with the democrats were fantastic all around the country. a lot of what he heard from them was a moment of opportunity for the majority of americans to band together we are going to look past the big top line issues were going to work together to create a better america. [applause] looks and i were running short on time here. this is something that i have struggled with for three or four years now. if you support trade come

support vaccine and brave federal society lawyers, i guess you have to be a democrat. so my question with that is, really unfair so i'm going to give you heads up. are you going to vote for jon all soft? you said the best one for last. first of all as a democratic senator he has done a great job representing the constituent needs and services. i know our office were close with his office with the first two years of his term. he was very responsive and how we interacted with our office. i think this only one republicans who can beat jon all soft that is brian kemp. i don't have any sort of inside baseball information. if he decides to run he could very, very likely beat jon all soft. i don't a few runs are not by the sense of being a litmus test on donald trump, i certainly

would never vote for donald trump or his surrogate. i certainly would vote for jon in that environment. [applause] we will see how this plays out. if donald trump does what he does will get a republican candidate that acts like herschel walker or marjorie taylor greene. i've had a couple things to say about them over the years. so, we will see. cooks actual last question of 60 seconds there. cooks and understand you're probably going to vote for bryant camp if it were to come to that. you have any red lines when you decide whether you can support certain republicans like they say this i cannot support them or is it i cannot define it i know it when he see a type of thing? seven growing list you think the 2020 election was rigged you are dead to me. [applause]

quickset is all of our time for thank you very much. governor jeff duncan. [applause] >> good afternoon. i'm from the state of south carolina. this is my fourth principles first conference. very pleased to introduce you today to our next moderator. has had a storied fascinating career as a journalist.

a speech writer, for first lady nancy reagan a columnist, political analyst, and a broadcast host. she presently is the policy editor and host of the podcast. please join me in giving a warm principal first welcome to mona. >> thank you all so much. i am delighted to be here. thank you to the principles first team for handling everything so well particularly the little excitement we had earlier today. i have the easiest job here at the principles first conference because i get to chat with two of the most insightful interesting and downright decent people in america. one is david french "new york times" columnist.

podcast her and of course legal expert. david was on my podcast which will drop tomorrow if you do not subscribe, please do that you can hear more from david and me. but, as i said to him an e-mail exchange you are utility infielder, you do it all. also delighted to welcome russell moore who is the editor-in-chief of christianity today. the author of losing our religion and altar call for evangelical america. russell has been involved in the culture wars up to his elbows. [laughter] and has taken a lot of flak. he has been very courageous about how he has handled these things.

we are going to talk today about religion and christian nationalism. but, i thought it would be good to begin with something about donald trump. tell me if you agree, i want to spin out something for you it is the theory of mind that he is different in the following way, there may be other ways but this one i'm going to test you on. if you watch that inaugural ceremony, it was drenched in religious imagery. you had franklin graham getting up there and instead of invoking one of the prophets, or asking god's blessing on this great nation, which is all traditional inaugurations. he looked around and gestured broadly meeting this guy and said look what the lord has

done. okay? just like trump has been listening to these people who have been telling him he was spared by the almighty to do great things. that near assassination in pennsylvania was god moving ghost had a fraction of an inch doesn't say why he did not this is my theory trump did not have much use for god in the past because all that love thy neighbor's stuff would have gotten in. now he thanks god himself is maga. so david i'll start with you. what you think of this theory? >> think the very interesting theory because you also have to understand who really has his ear in the christian movement right now.

who really has his ear is not the franklin graham types as much in the franklin graham does to some extent, saw the classic old school southern baptist or presbyterians. it's part of this pentecostal movement that is drenched in prophecy about donald trump. just drenched it. as you might have a baptist or presbyterian god is in control, god is sovereign is taken as a general truism with the pentecostal prophecies around it. it is not general god is in control, it's god's picked this person for this time. by the way because god has picked this person for this time you are posing god you're not on the side of stay tuned.

right now the reality of public policy both home and abroad is if you're friends with donald trump, you are friends with the american government if you're not friends with donald trump you are not friends of the american government. this is something deeply in him. what message would be more inclined to prick his gear and the spiritual sense and when it says you are god's man, everyone is opposing you, is opposing god's plan for america. i'm glad you began with that because it really introduces a point i want to make. the level of fanaticism is disproportionally and pentecostalism but not exclusively. the level of fanaticism we are now seeing on donald trump is unlike anything that i have seen. including anything i've seen the trump era. it is just escalating and

escalating around supernatural processes in the sense of defined mission, divine protection, divine sanction around the person of donald trump. click so russell, is there no pushback or not significant pushback among christians? i'm not a christian but it sure sounds like idolatry to me. [applause] >> welcome think the division that we have right now in churches tends to be between people who went there church politicized and people who do not want their church politicized. you have two very different psychologies at work. so the people who are not on board with this kind of thing are also the people who typically wants to be unified. they do not want to argue about the stuff at sunday school or in small groups as opposed to those

who really do want to politicized. the interesting thing that we have seen is the shift from the appeal to evangelicals in 2016 from now. mike pence was the vice president because the assumption was you have to build evangelicals with somebody who supports traditional family values, is pro-life and so forth. i think donald trump tested that theory and found that his constituency, they don't vote for him because he hold certain positions. they adapt to certain positions because he holds them. i could have never imagined saying in 2016 that a republican president would appoint a pro-choice secretary of health and human services, would announce an idf policy heat like he did the other day.

and there's almost nothing a response. i think he is tested that. cook some to stick with you for a second, russell. you had this line quoted by our friend in his book. it really summed up something and i like to hear you expand upon it. the church is bleeding out the next generation. not because the culture was so opposed to the fidelity to the truth. but just the reverse. culture often does not reject us because they don't believe the church moral teachings. but because of the evidence the church doesn't believe its own moral teachings walks must have a ministry young christian came to me and said i have a crisis of faith, it was typically over miracles or they thought

morality was too strict or something along those lines. i almost never encounter that now. instead it is i don't believe the church believes all of the things i have been taught. i had one woman came up to me one time and said my daughter came to college and is having a spiritual crisis. she said the atheists she knows demonstrate peace, hope, love, gentleness, self-control more than the people are church. [applause] >> so david, there is a lot of evidence that churches are losing members. there are now, if i understand it, more people in america that identify as none than all white protestants put together.

i found this really interesting little data in the pew research. it says people were more likely to vote for trump. i should say of course voting for trump does not make you a bad person necessarily. there's murmuring in the crowd. [laughter] i hear you, believe me. but, with the pew data it shows is that among frequent-in 2016 we heard there's a lot of people called themselves evangelical but they weren't really churchgoers. they were casually attached and using that label and they voted for trump. but, the really religious people who were in the pews every sunday, they were not caught onto this at all.

now you see people weakly churchgoers are more likely to vote for trump than those who are loosely attached. the only group for whom this is not true lease among white protestants is the mainline churches. iron for all this data to late 2015, early 2016 there is a lifelong evangelical i was like those of the non- churchgoing evangelicals supporting trout and all that went away. when there's no doubt he was the republican nominee and there's a statistician religion and brian burke i would encourage anyone to follow him if you are curious about the raw facts white and republicans are white evangelicals.

there is just a total total identity between the party and the church. and it is so total, mona he also charted outward every other major religious group in america fall regarding ideologically compared to the two parties? they found that every other religious group in america whether it's in black protestants or sell it to the right of the democratic party. members of the lds church were slight to the left of the republican party. atheists are slowly to the right of the democrat party but every group had its own sort of individual distinct identity. nonwhite evangelicals which is left of the republican party people white evangelicals were identically aligned with the republican party. until when trump secured the nomination what he inherited was basically 40 years of a culture that has taught white evangelicals acclimate evangelical i am a republican. so whoever is the republican nominee is not evaluated on their own merits necessarily.

they are a republican, i am a republican. this is part of my identity as a christian. and so therefore i am voting. so essentially what happened he becomes the republican standard bearer. he became the only option for tons of evangelicals because again they have been taught for 40 years support could be sinful. support me you're not even a christian. and so this locked in and connected him to this church culture. so that was stage one. and then stage two is this a radicalization process that began to kick in. because again they are taught again for 40 years if that media doesn't like somebody, i need to like somebody. at the democrats are really motivated to get somebody than i need to have their back. and so he locks into all of this

i talked about a moment ago, the prophecies, the declarations for major spiritual leaders that america is about to fall if he does not win. he just benefited came in and b0 years of acculturation in the white evangelical church and then it just got turned because every time he got worse, the intensity of the road your support for him grew all the more. and that what was so stunning to me. every display of bad behavior the religious leaders who had backed him to the hill had to dig in more. they just kept digging into the point where i knew we were cooked. totally cooked as a conservative movement by january 7, 2021. i get to everyone else of professional politics could see which was on january 7 of the

three big most powerful republicans in america at that point between mitch mcconnell, mike pence donald trump with republicans mike pence approval plummeted. mcconnell's approval plummeted donald trump stayed sky high with republicans. that taught me the radicalization was essentially complete. it was completed by that time and fulfilled now. correct so russell, it sounds like in this process of radicalization, these particular kinds of evangelical christians kind of bleach jesus out. [laughter] donald trump junior says well, turn the other cheek what has that ever gotten us? [laughter] >> is worse than that. as i've mentioned before, i started hearing from pastors who would say whenever they parenthetically quoted from the sermon on the mount if someone

strikes you, turn the other cheek. that people would come up after words and say orders get the liberal talking points? from jesus christ. what was most disturbing about a lot of the stories is that when the pastor said i am quoting from matthew, the response does isnot oh, i'm sorry it is that was fine for then. but we are in a state of emergency right now. we are in a hostile culture so those things do not apply as the jews are worth delivering the sermon on the mount and mayberry instead of the roman empire. [laughter] [applause] what you seem to be sketching out, both of you is this is a form of idolatry it's post-

christian, right? because if it doesn't really involve the gospel, if it's not about traditional christian virtues that have been successfully taught and transmitted for 2000 years, it's about a party and there's a good line in a piece in the atlantic he quoted a pastor who said for a lot of these people christianity is more of a hood ornament than a true faith. [applause] what do you make of that? is that we are dealing with are these people post- christian? >> i think what is at the root of a lot of this is boredom. i think there is such an absence of genuine connection and genuine experience of transcendence in american life right now that people came get a kind of jolt in artificial

simulation of life by hating people and lining up behind a political ideology. i think often what steve o'bannon said to the atlantic when he said he got the guys who's dave from accounts payable but online he can be ajax the warrior. dave from accounts payable when he dies people will stand up and say some words and go home. ajax the warrior has a funeral pyre. but i want to do is give dave from accounting the idea of being ajax the warrior all the time. and so there is a sense in which there is a feeling of doing something by lining up behind an ideology and find of the centers are in exile them. our danger, those of us who are not on board with that is we can

do the same thing with anxiety. we can feel as though we are doing something simply by giving up hope. and worrying about it rather than marching forward. >> you have not succumbed to that. you have formed an organization called the after party. if you could both tell us a little bit about what you do and how that's going. >> quickly after party we create a new christian curriculum that focused much more about recalling the how of a politics in the what the what would be what tax rate is there? what level to of aid to grant what border security? if you're looking for the bible to give you the answers for all the policy questions you're going to be looking for a long time. the bible is like life on policy really is.

but the bible is heavy on virtue. i was speaking southeastern baptist theological seminary a couple years ago and it somebody asked me, what book are you reading right now to get you through this moment? i gave the most evangelical answer ever and i said it's the bible purpose at a very specific way i'm reading the new testament. knowing every syllable of that book is written to a people infinitely more oppressed than american christians are. infinitely. imagine you pull somebody from the coliseum they are about to be facing the lions and they are like you think you had it bad? you just had a beating, i know but i just endured at tweeting. [laughter] until you're just in this world where there is the sense that

has developed has a sense of emergency. just worked for then not now. so, what we wanted to do the after party is rebalance the instruction around the biblical waiting. the biblical waiting really is on virtue. it's on ethics comments on morality or theme verses in michael six: eight. what does the lord require of you? it is to act justly. you do not forsake justice to be the nicest person in the room. you act justly, you walk humbly with the lord your god. our message to the church is very simple. at those three virtues, those three justice, kindness, and humility are not present we are not doing it right. then we are not doing it right.

what i will tell you is that it was amazing to me. even amongst pastors that would join in on zoom calls and are currently friendly to our perspective, still have the same question what if that doesn't work? what do you mean? what do you mean what if that doesn't work? these are not contingent commands, right? love, clothes, unless you live the 2016 presidential. what were really trying to say is here are the non- negotiable minimum standards of conduct through which christians how we should present ourselves into the political arena. by the way the political arena is not a special morality free zone. it is not. fight trying to do that we try to refocus the values where the bible actually emphasizes them.

cook say think you said at one point that for some christians i am a [bleep] on twitter by volunteer at the soup kitchen once a week, right? that does not obliterate. i'm a fantastic sunday school teacher, i can be ajax online meet vicious and cruel to people. which again there is no biblical sanction from that. and also a lot of people in this country only encounter evangelicals through the political sphere first. are we putting our best foot forward there? no. but collectively the message being sent forward from the christian community is white evangelical community is i am afraid of you and i don't like

you. i am preparing to go to battle against you. that's the message being sent that is hard to me conceive of a message more opposite for the love of christ. [applause] and asked but evangelicals have always had to do you'd seem to think evangelicals are cicadas who are in dormancy until the iowa caucus every four years and then come out. there's more to it than that. we moved into a time that is not just that religion has become politicized. for the in or out have to do with political and partisan and ideological categories. but we have found there actually

are who what christianity do not want to go to church in order to sign up for political arguments of any kind left or center. but who don't know how to do that. until i get the question constantly from when i first started in ministry i would have parents who would say that we were adult son or daughter, how do i deal with them? now it's almost always the reverse. i've young christians relationship with my mom and dad but all they want to do is argue about trump. what do i do? a lot of people sing this not what i'm here for work every them on the political spectrum so what is it look like and what do we do? so that is what we said, as david said not the list of principles.

one of these that was really alarming to me i went to a spiritual crisis as a teenager. one of the reasons is because there is a christian coalition voting guide in my church. i am looking at the christian position and thinking to myself where is the christian position on the line item veto which was there? it just seems like the christian physician happens to line up perfectly with all of the planks of this candidate. >> you should not read saint st. markit's right in there. [laughter] until the question is, is just the memes to an end? i came to the conclusion it is not. it's a deeper, it's more important, it is true. that's one of the reasons why it is so tragic to see it turn into just another arena for political artistic.

>> put an exclamation point of what you're saying earlier about how political missteps are becoming the religious litmus test. an actual person with some notoriety actually tweeted this out not long ago. creates and confessions are not enough. if you want to know if you church is sound, ask your pastor what he thanks of david french. and if he likes me, or run away from that church. the church. this actually happened in the world. it is utterly bizarre. quickset is in the new testament. who do you say david french is? [laughter] >> okay, i think we are running out of time. one last thing i would ask you to talk about with us. is there a hunger out there for the real thing do you get that

feedback? that maybe aren't the loudest but feel they have been losing something because the church is getting so politicized. and there is an appetite for simply to come along and say do you know what? we need to put that aside and focus back on god and one another and all of that. >> absolutely. there a lot of those people and a lot of those people are very young. who do not have a social pressure to have to belong to a church. they are part of the church because they really do believe in jesus. when things we saw is the main line churches became very partisan and politicized in the 60s and 70s. where the easter message tells us how to recycle and that kind of thing. were you at every issue turning into a policy sort of argument. people could figure out what

leftist politics i could just do it. now there are people figuring out if i went to the right wing politics i can do that without giving up sunday morning. there are a lot of people say we don't want that we really doing to follow christ. but they are not sure how to do it. one of the things i get constantly is some christians who are saying give us a word of hope my response to that is to say, the bible tells us hope that is seen is not hope. instead suffering leads to endurance. endurance leads a character. character at least i hope. so genuine hope is not reassurance this is all going to turn out okay. instead it is long term yes, things are going to turn out okay. but, it may be that what god is doing right now in the church requires a time being baffled

and bewildered. rather than just coming up with another market driven blueprint which got us into this mess in the first place. [applause] >> i teach at my alma mater a christian school in nashville. i can tell you that the kids i am teaching make me generally hopeful for the future of the church. because the kids i am teaching art love your neighbor christians. they are not fear the world christians. i think a lot of us, it may be in this room this is me in the church as i grew up i grew up ii gripping fear of the world churches for everything was about training you to go forth and do battle. go forth and fight. it created this weird hairtrigger mentality where is the persecution? right? and then you're 17 and high school so it offers you a beer you say no and they say come on

man there it is, there is the persecution. and so it create a fight or flight response that's creating the problem that we have. but, what i am seeing is that young people, older folks, middle-aged people kindness. they are hungry for it. they are desperate for it. i think this is a love your moment for countercultural christianity. when circles are on the fruit of the spirit kindness, peace, self-control. we do not have too much of that out there, right? would i have found in this discs just been some incredible work done. i do not know if you've read some but derek thompson has written in the atlantic we just do not spend time with each other anymore. we are not around each other. there's a group called over zero that has a belonging index about two thirds of americans feel a

sense of non- blogging in their homes, community and workplaces. for my satisfied if your liver neighbor christian that is like your music. any debby debby fans in your? like other than me? [laughter] one of my greatest moments as i saw gerry the king lawler russell tojo yamamoto in a texas cage match live in impersonator. >> me too, that was great. [laughter] >> incredible, incredible stuff in the wrestling world you always know who is coming up through because of the music. like that's the undertaker's music, he is coming. i feel like all of this loneliness in all this lack of belonging, i do not know what our music would be strains of amazing grace or something. that is our music. that's a may come out to heal those hurts we come out to demonstrate love in the face of hatred. that's make him out to demonstrate kindness in the face of cruelty. this is the moment for the

church. this is the moment when hatred arises, love arises, the greater. and so i think that we should not be discouraged by the hatred. we can lamented, we can grieve it but do not be discouraged by. do not be discouraged by the bomb threats, be motivated but motivated in a specific way, in a way to heal this country. and that is true when there's a hunger beyond is teaching on the secular campus or my students, i don't think any of them and ever met an evangelical christian and tell me. and one of them assumed i'm anti- trump i am a liberal is ad starts asking questions and i was answering the questions. so wait a minute, you are kind of the bible something revival preacher? and i said yes i feel so seen

after four years of being called a cultural marxist. that's exactly what i am. and we talked about ultimate matters in life and death. there are a lot of people asking those questions and who want to belong to a genuinely counterculture community. it would be a shame if there were not a church or to do that. >> well, with that i will say thank you both so much. this is been a great conversation. thank you all. [applause] [applause] [inaudible] [inaudible conversations] >> just a quick announcement for the press in the room. we will have oppressive briefing availability about 5:00 p.m.

regarding the security situation that occurred after the summit concludes around 5:00 p.m. so it will be from the stage here in this room. we will do that once the summit concludes. thanks. [inaudible conversations] >> good afternoon everyone. we are once again so glad you're here i introduce myself earlier to a few of you. my name is elizabeth i am a longtime maryland resident just about 5 miles up the road here. this is my second principles first and my second time as a

volunteer which is very rewarding by the way. it is my honor to introduce an extra per presenters who really need no introduction. mr. steve hayes editor ceo of the dispatch an online magazine based out of annapolis, maryland topics and crew shares crucial information thought-provoking cited opinions with a touch of humor. mr. jonah goldberg as editor-in-chief cofounder of the dispatch mr. michael worn also with the dispatch as a senior editor please join me in welcoming our panel of distinguished guests. [applause]

an interview with secretary of defense pete hegseth and our old colleague shannon bream. asked some questions about ukraine. the back-and-forth, if i am summarizing, is it the case that you say that russia invaded ukraine and hegseth gave from a series of dodging answers and ended by saying, this is all very complicated. so, my question to you first, , is this very complicated? >> first of all, thank you all for having me here. really kind of hoping i would be on a panel with somebody else.

[laughter] >> site mike warren like that. >> mike is fine. [laughter] this is, you know there is this great passage from confucius where he talks about where society when names stop being descriptors of reality, society goes crazy. that is why he calls for the rectification of the names. and that simple, let's put it this way, the real gas lighting that is going on is not about, you know, this or that discrete issue or whether or not a hurricane would hit alabama or whatever the outrage that trump says or whether or not zelensky poll numbers are low. all of those lies matter and they bother me and, if you had

told me 30 years ago that i would be one of these dudes with the importance of truth i would have been offended. not because i am against it 30 years ago but because i was not one of those finger waving kind of type steered i would want to smash your good targets the delta house wall. i think truth is like the most important thing. the real gas lighting going on right now is not about any discrete live. it is about the idea itself that any of this is complicated. that, oh, washington in politics right now, it makes no sense. it is like wacky japanese game show. they must know behind-the-scenes what they are doing. there has to be some sort of master plan. even some of trump's opponents and critics, somehow deep down because they want to impose order on chaotic world, he has a master plan, he is upton

something. it is really complicated. the reality is that 90% of this stuff, it is really base lizard brain crap. making this really important point that there is a difference between lying and will ship. because, lying is kind of a sign of respect to the truth. the lawyer knows what the truth is and is denying it in a very specific way. the bull shooter just does not care whether something is true or false. you will throw out half-truths, whole truths, partial truths, this truth, that truth or horrible -- whole lies or any other flavor just to make sure that the truth is just an afterthought. just to get what you want. that is the mo of this administration, basically. looking for loyalists, looking to have its way about everything trump has very basic mob boss

attitude about foreign policy. sort of like the scene in the blues brothers. what kind of music do you play here? country and western. a mob boss attitude towards politics and international affairs and domestic affairs. other than that, not much else. but the desire to say that it is complicated, you get these guys on the sunday shows talking about whether or not to started this war. it is not complicated. it is not complicated how those babies died in gaza. it is just very straightforward and it takes political courage just to tell the truth. even when it is inconvenient to your own side. that is what is so profoundly lacking these days. [applause] >> jonah quoted confucius and

the blues brothers. can you compete with that? >> i will not even try. i was promised i would get a chainsaw when i come up here. [laughter] you missed that part. look, i think that the complicated sort of hairy which is what that is, the very simple questions of who invaded whom. it is an indication to me that pete hegseth in this case, you can sort of look at it for many trump administrations or a trump apologist and the media, and activists, whatever, it is a sort of admission, and implicit admission that they know that they are kind of cool shooting. it is a way of voiding the very

simple answer. it is a way to say i cannot actually tell you what the real truth is. what is obvious. what we know is the truth because that makes things very complicated for me. so i have to announce that it is complicated. look, we are in a situation where people are, have completely, sort of in peril about the new administration. they do not really know what to do. the only thing that they sort of know how to deal with this, let me back up, and the first administration, common sense of we have to maybe keep this guy on the rails. keep him from doing things that he does not even know are dangerous. things that he does not even

know are, you know, that he should be doing. a sense in this new world that fear is kind of at work here. we just got to fall in line. we just got to kind of bull ship our way through this. so you end up with situations like hegseth said today. it is unfortunate, i like to think, not to make this an advertisement for the dispatch. >> you can do that. >> sure, go ahead. >> that is what a publication like ours exists to do. one of the reasons i've very proud to work there is to kind of just say, we do not have two, we don't have to make things more complicated in order to please someone or somebody or some movement or something like that.

we can just tell you that it is very simple, actually. russia did invade ukraine and leave it at that. i cannot think of a movie. >> i had not really thought about this before. no one sort of pointed out, you know, one of the useful mental tech meeks in this era is to take people as if they actually mean what they are saying. we are so used to assuming that they are just lying and spinning to get out of these deer in the headlight moments that they cannot actually mean it. it is worth pointing out. let's just say for the sake of argument that pete hegseth actually believes it is complicated. [laughter] well, how does that influence the foreign-policy craftsmanship that we will have going forward? for the sake of argument, marco rubio honestly believes that donald trump is the greatest dealmaker in only he could fix this complex geopolitical

situations. like, how does the policy process, what does the policy process look like amongst a bunch of people that actually believe those things are true. that in some ways would be scarier than if they are all just trying to cover their asses and say what the boss wants to hear. >> here's a question that occurs to me. a story that probably some of you are dispatch members have heard before. so, i was at the donald trump event when he went after john mccain. this was in ames iowa in 2015. he was being interviewed on the stage. he was one of i think 12, 13, 14 republican presidential wannabes being interviewed by mccain. i was there to cover everybody else and not really paying attention to donald trump.

i did not think that he was likely to catch fire and be the republican nominee. in this appearance, franklin has asked him about john mccain and trump goes on and says i prefer soldiers who were not captured and basically blames him for his own capture. some crazy insults. having a little presser with trump after this moment and there were probably a dozen of us. there is video of this somewhere i looked at trump and i asked him a question. i was losing my cool. i was mad. i thought that it was ridiculous that he had said what he had said he had if i had to do it again i maybe would've been a little bit more even. i was insulted by it so i confronted him. i am reading his quotes from my notebook. my job for the past 30 years is to take really good notes on

what people say. i am pretty good at it. i was reading exact quotes. how could you say that you prefer soldiers that are not captured. how could you suggest that john mccain was somehow an inferior soldier because he spent time in the pow. and trump looked right back at me and just denied that he had said what he had just said. i did not say that. and i read him the quote again. he denied it again. i read in the quote again i was just criticizing the position of veteran issues. you do have this moment or at least i have this moment where you stop and you think, did i totally screw this up? did i misunderstand? covering politics for 20 years. i was so unaccustomed to someone lying that aggressively. it was on video. 1500 of us in the auditorium.

just denied what he had just said. my question to you, mind you, this is not new, trump did this a lot. the second brief story, working with brett they are at some questions, brett had a big interview with trump coming up on fox news when i was still at fox news. at the tail end of the donald trump driven narrative that rafael cruz had been involved in the jfk assassination. it is gone on for two weeks. we later found out from court documents that the national enquirer was in on this. the whole thing was a set up. i'm working on these questions with brett and on the one hand and a normal new cycle with a normal politician, we probably would've concluded that this

story would've ran its course. it'd been thoroughly debunked. as we worked on the question, you know, i think it is really question that you ask him once again. even though this has been thoroughly debunked, especially because this has been thoroughly debunked. ask him once again. do you think that rafael cruz, to his great credit, asking trump once again, the story had gone away, the story basically died. trump had basically said, yeah. i am paraphrasing. this was reported in the national enquirer. remember the national enquirer had john edwards. probably right about this, too. this whole thing where there is not even a moment where he stops and says, like, is this true? can people check me on it.

i think that's how he can say things like vladimir zelinski is responsible for starting the war russia is not the aggressor. my question for you guys, is this somehow worse? i do think you see people like pete hegseth having trouble answering these very basic questions of reality, truth. are more people willing to rely on this today than before. how we got to the point where perception matters as much as reality in some cases where they can create this alternative reality and that is what the president of the united states, the leader of the free world uses to make its decisions have we reach this point where perception matters as much as reality? >> i think that we have.

i do not like saying that because i like to be an optimistic person. we are in a moment where it is patently obvious that there are decisions being made that we have an administration that has sort of run, go back to the campaign. go back to the most recent campaign. we have had weeks of kind of debate about whether immigrants were eating cats in springfield ohio. that is a great example where it did not really matter whether it was true. did not really matter whether the mayor of springfield was trying to talk about we actually welcome, you know, these migrants here because they have done good things for our community. what was important was the

bigger point that immigration was out of control and the biden administration had been to permissive on these sorts of things. the actual facts on the ground should have mattered. >> almost acknowledging this. it helped us. it helped us make this bigger political point. they objected the fake but accurate. that is what dan rather did. he forged documents to make a document on 60 minutes. used to care about that. >> yeah, so, i've written about this a bunch. i deserve a small portion of the blame. for the american rights obsession i was one of the first guys to write about the problem. my first book i talked about hilary clinton.

>> zelinski was very effective community organizer. i remember that phrase, how big that was who basically believed and say whatever you need to say , demonize whoever you need to demonize in order to win your fight. he was an influence on barack obama, and influence on hilary clinton, i probably emphasized it too much. i argued with one of the problems with the left is how much they have internalized. i watched it happen in real time i pointed out that one of the dedications is to lucifer. i thought that was kind of a tell. jonah, that is complicated. [laughter] i watch in real time as the

right went from that same the left always wins to we have to be them, too. i am not saying like jd vance has studied or anything like that, but pushing this argument, all of these people pushing this argument. watching in real time over the last 15 years or so, the right went from criticizing the left for its abuses of power and truth to saying the only way we can beat the left is to do the exact same thing. now, lying and twisting and distorting has become sort of a future not above and you see it all over the place. i think it sort of raises a larger concern for me which is that when you are talking about the first term, trump was, you know, a lot of people in his administration. a lot of people who had lines that they would not cross. and, you know, mike pence is the

most famous example of that. he, you know, he waited until pretty close to the end where he had allied that he would not cross. he paid a significant price for that. we are now seeing not just at the cabinet level in the sub cabinet little -- level but in the rank-and-file level. this view, this approach is normal. this is not like what you have to do an extremist, this is a regrettable last resort. this is actually just politics now. evan burke gives a very famous speech called the birds of prey speech. he was talking about how, it marks a really important milestone in the history of sort of understanding foreign policy

and colonialism and all sorts of things along those lines. he makes this argument that the young officers who were there as part of the british east india company, they are doing bad things to the indians and he condemns that. but he also said, they are internalizing the idea that this is a fine thing to do. and then they are coming back to england with this distorted and deformed understanding of what decency and political decency is and it is corrupting us here at home. i still talk with a lot of young people. thinking that this is that matt gates is the person you want to emulate. this is how you do politics. it is very depressing to me. it is not focusing on trump. trump is a 78-year-old dude.

the actuarial tables will eventually be right. but we've got a whole generation of people who they are now invested in the idea that this is how you do politics. this is how you think about politics. it is a lot about glory and almost nothing about honor. or virtue. you can see that in how we are treating ukraine and the defenses of it and this outrageous extortion that trump is trying to impose on ukraine which is fundamentally dishonorable. you can see how we are treating our native allies. thinking that it is for suckers to actually pair -- care about your word and integrity on the international stage. the day today petty little bs all over the place. that will take a long time to work out of the system. >> mike, let me pick up and ask

about the conservative moment. you have been writing about a part of the conservative movement for many years. the stuff you are doing for us these days i think sort of really looks at some of the kids into the cracks of the conservative movement. touches the raw stuff that should be touched. what should we think about the conservative movement? is there conservative movement anymore? has it been overly taken and overwhelmed by the mega movement what happened to classical liberals. >> there are dozens of us. >> i was going to say, in this room is probably when you are talking about the extent of the conservative movement it may not be much bigger. look, i believe that there still exists a rump of people even

here in d.c. where you hold onto that. i do think that the conservative movement have been consumed by mag. for all intents and purposes it is what the conservative movement is now. i think that is how you can look at looking at this. you can look at any mainstream media coverage for. conservative movement are activists, becoming synonymous with activists in the movement. perception is reality in that sense. i think that there is, it is important, though, for someone like me who it's reporting on this and is sort of trying to hold, you know, hold subjects to the fire on certain principles

that they may have said or proclaimed just to point out the cognitive dissidents or separations of words for folks in the past. i've written a lot about the heritage foundation. to me, it is a great example of the co-opting of the conservative movement. this is a thing tank that was created back in 1973, i believe. as a sort of antidote to republicanism. can we inject some conservative ideas well into governance? particularly in reaction to the wage and price controls and this sort of expansion of the welfare state. a noble goal. something that heritage did well for a long time.

it is a tragedy in a preventable tragedy for the conservative movement completely been taken over as willingly allowing itself to be taken over by a populist movement that on so many things it is on conservative but when the number one conservative think tank in washington that is thought of as conservative when it comes taken over then i mean i do think we have a situation that is what the conservative movement looks like now. there will be people that sort of hold that reaganite flame. we try to do it as the dispatch.

there will be mistakes. maybe it will revive again. maybe not in my lifetime. >> i spent a lot of my day cutting myself so don't get me wrong. i am a little bit more upbeat than that. an enormous amount of people that really wish it did not have to be this way. many of them are elected republican. >> fewer than there were in 2016 i used to call the closet normals the biggest block on the republican side. that is not the case anymore. now they are much more of a remnant. with that said, there are a lot of people in our line of work, i do not want to get into a name being, but he really wanted

somebody, desantis, nicki, somebody to be the nominee. but the fundamental thing that distorts so much of our politics is the need to be anti-left. and, so, so long as trump has, can drink those tears, then the sort of tribal object kicks in and a lot of people will fall in line and, don't get me wrong, we can talk about policy things where i think trump is more the right side than the wrong side or at least all of that stuff, kind of secondary, the simple point is that, you know, for those of you my wife had my favorite new yorker cartoon blown up and framed for me and it has two dogs drinking martinis and suit in manhattan and one dog says to the other it is not good enough the dog succeed. they must also fail.

the thing that puts asses in the seats for republican politics these days and that is what causes a lot of people to seem more than they actually are i get it, but at the same time, democracy is about arguments. arguments that we will need to

make in the future and you need to have credibility. you need to up not just gone into full derangement about this stuff. pro- or anti-. make the arguments and stay focused on the facts. that is what will win in the long run. >> back to you on this question. i'm going to set aside the temptation to talk about joe not losing his own mind for a minute when you look at what trump is doing these days, just take the policies at face value. look at what he is doing. he is hardly conservative in any way that we would understand it. look at the labor secretary nominee. look at hulsey gabbard. growth snowed in. pro- syria. pro- russia. rfk junior, i think one of the most fascinating moment in the

past decade of our politics was ted cruz enthusiastic endorsement of the guy who thought obamacare did not go far enough. her single-payer, rfk is for single payer. ted cruz brought the u.s. congress to a halt in 2013 with a 21 hour filibuster. obamacare was way too far. now he is for a guy that thinks obamacare did not go far enough. so much of the stuff that we are seeing is not conservative in any identifiable way and there is a real question about whether , you know, is the republican party a limited republican party in any appreciable way. >> i think the republican part -- >> that's all right, someone's phone got away from them. >> i think there are lots of people in the republican party

who believe that they are a limited government. that's part of the reason they like this doge stuff. they are looking at it from a very flattering angle. but they are convincing themselves as part of the woman government argument. there is something there, something to that there. but at the end of the day, look, i hate talking about pieces i have not written yet and are new ideas, valerie asked me to write about this, is there a distinction between right-wing and conservatives now. i am working on that now and i've been thinking about that for a while. there really is. right wing to a certain extent, dress code is populism. i've been writing against populism for 30 years. i can send you the links. for the first 20 years of that, that just made me part of the sort of dairy established intellectual wing of

conservativism. now it makes me a rhino cup sellout that just does not know what time it is or whatever. but populism historically is fundamentally a left-wing link. it is about grievance politics, it is inherited in late anti- intellectual and it basically says that the state must satisfy my needs. he lists of the arguments and of the cost. generally gets bound up in personality and it can be right wing in terms of its cultural sentiment, in terms of its attitudes about various things, left-wing can be very mean and the right wing can be very mean. there's a difference between the meanness. i think the republican party has been a flawed vehicle for limited government for a long time. compassion and conservatism being a problem. but, now, i think that is

essentially a personality more than anything else. it does not mean everybody has given up their limited government. they are just perfectly willing to put them on a very high shelf and visit them later as a basically just say whatever the big guy says is right i trust him. >> is that a limited government party today? >> no. i think all of what is happening with doge, elon musk, kind of just taking a side to the federal government is actually hurting the case for limited government in the long run because it is indiscriminate. i have neighbors with people that work for the federal government and their people that work with them that need to be fired. peanut they are not the ones

taking the buyout. >> that is right. the whole process is the wrong way you would go about this. we have not talked about process either. you know, we are supposed to be a nation of flaws and of the constitution and money that is been appropriated by congress that needs to be spent because that is what the constitution requires. the executive branch's job is not to cut things that they do not like. it is to execute what congress has appropriated and asked them what the laws to have it execute it is not only not a vessel for limited government, not just constitutional government either frankly there's a problem before trump, not just with the republican party, i think it's a huge problem with the democratic party. these things getting stacked on top of each other and everybody

kind of says, well, they did it. it reminds me when my kids, do not get mad at me because my brother did it, too. everybody just ends up doing it worse than the last guy so it is , no. >> that is depressing. >> sorry. we will wrap it up there. i want to thank keith for having us. thank you all for your attention i've had a good time talking to many good dispatch members here yesterday and today. if you are not a member, go to dispatch.com and check us out. you can sign us up for free. things again for having us. appreciate it. [applause]

>> good afternoon. i am andy. this is my third summit. i found out i would introduce andrew and steven and i thought about a favorite quote from senator john mccain. we were born to love and we were born to have the courage for it so be brave. adam steven and whistleblowers i've worked with to expose abuse in women soccer shows the courage and the heartfelt care for others can speed transformative forces for good. if love of country plus courage that led them arrayed the attack on the capital was a wake-up call. it was a direct assault on the peaceful transfer of power.

a bedrock of our republic. many of my party chose to downplay or defend the actions of those tools sought to overturn a free and fair election. i could not in good conscious remain silent. i like being able to look in the mirror and i looked over to telling my son what it means to stand against the pressure of the masses. the principal perspective is also popular with voters despite what you may hear. a recent washington post poll shows that 83% of americans oppose president trumps pardons of january 6 offenders. i said that we've got to see why yesterday and now i can update it today as well. public service and body in our core principles through costly personal actions. i hope they stay i look forward to the conversation and i welcome them up to the stage. [applause]

>> thank you. hey. what's up. [applause] [laughter] thank you guys. thank you. let me just say, mccain also had a favorite saying of mine, it's always darkest before it gets pitch black. >> that is how we will start this today. this one is good. fantastic. ladies and gentlemen, adam integer, a husband, a dad, a pilot, a congressman who served illinois to different districts in illinois on the select committee and i think more than maybe anyone who has been with principles first over the last not just this year, the year before, the year before, going with principles pretty much since the beginning i think to

borrow from a previous panel, adam kissinger is our gladiator in the ring. let's give it up for our fighter thank you. thank you. okay. so, i know you want to talk about the proud boys and their little visit yesterday and they are e-mail. before we begin, i have some bad news. he has decided there is a little bit of fact and principles first and, so, adam, i am hoping you can concisely explain to me at five bullet points what you did last week. >> that is a good one. that is a good one. >> i am gone. >> what have you been up to lately? just some brief highlights. what have you been up to lately? thank you for being here.

i've been here, i've never seen a crowd like this obviously. this is an amazing message. thanks for sticking around after the chaos. stephen, if you don't know, this is a hero, this is somebody that was on -- [cheers and applause] >> he was on the front lines of defending democracy. i consider what i did as the artillery. i would go on tv, just that guy in washington. when you are a local person and people see you at the store and you are still on the front line, that is much harder. what you did is heroic and what you continue to do his heroic. so thank you. what have you been up to? >> i'm still doing the cnn gig, senior political contributor with cnn. i have a sub stack, please join my -- >> mark cuban would want you to

say the website three different times. >> i'm doing a lot of speaking and have my organization country first, i've got to tell you what i'm really excited about, we've been sitting around for a couple months looking are wounds trying to figure out what now, how do we -- what i'm feeling, this energy that's popped up in the last week, americans ready to fight back and i'm going to tell you, it's going to take, obviously if there is an election that will be the most important thing but americans standing up, having their voice heard saying things like we are not going to let the richest man and most powerful man tell us how to live anymore and we are not going to allow our members of congress and the senate to pretend they have our best interests at heart when they clearly don't, they are there to do what donald trump wants, not what the district wants, not what is good for the country, what donald trump wants, that may fly in an

election and get donald trump elected, that's not going to fly long-term and i look forward to helping with all of you to leave -- lead that charge to take our country back. >> that's good. okay. according to raw story, they posted the email that was first received and among other things, unflattering things, it said mark cuban, chris christie, john bolton, george conway, mike letter, adam kinzer go, bill kristol, stephen richard, all deserve to die. why do you think you were -- seventh, and what do you -- getting back to opm have you been doing enough over the last two weeks, is that alphabetical? i don't know. >> it's not alphabetical.

thank you. thank you. know if you work on it. they expanded the college football playoffs. let me just say this. i don't -- i despise the fact that course language has become such a part of our political dialogue, but sometimes i think the only thing you can explain something with is course language, forgive me for saying this but what a bunch of sissies. it is the only way to describe it, if you as your total existence, you've now decided you're going to try to intimidate people that come together and say we want to put principals first, we oppose your political business but here is what we want and you are going to come and think you are going to intimidate us,

intimidate harry done, guess what, you won't and there is nothing you can do that will intimidate me. i have just decided to be twice against you because of that. so to me, that is why it is so important you all stuck around and stayed here. you can threaten us, you can try to belittle us, you can try to play act like you are a bunch of brownshirts but you are not going to win. we are going to win and i know that for a fact. >> thank you all for being here. i know most people are not from the dc/metro area. it means a lot to me. that means a lot to adam. switching topics. we've got pete hegseth, kelsey gabbard, cash motel, rfk junior, which one do you think is going to be even worse than this group things and which one do you think might pleasantly surprise us a little bit?

>> if i had to pick who i think could potentially not be as bad as we expect because i have to pick one i would say there is a possibility it is hegseth and only for this reason. when you are the civilian leadership you either have, this happens with secretary of the air force or army, you either are a leader in that position or you are led by the officers in that position. pete hegseth is so outmatched in terms of the pentagon, the bureaucracy, the fact that he has no experience that i hope that actually the four stars in the pentagon continue that ship going where it needs to be and he can sit there, i've already seen it. he should be too busy to sit there and tweet videos about work and dei and dollars stuff but he has enough time to do it so i think it's quite possible

they may be patting him on the head and saying we will go kill americans and you can tweet about dei, the one i worry about, the most, is kash patel. the damage he can do in terms of the trust that the american people have in the fbi, in our system, that's one of the reasons i was so angry about not january 6th but even before that, when the president claimed the election was stolen is once you break trust in these institutions, it's really tough to build trust back. the fbi. it has been politicized by the right more than anything but once you break that trust and make a political tool i don't know how the fbi operates where people can trust, so that's probably the one i'm more concerned about not for my own self because come on, bring it, honestly. but because of what it could do to the damage in the face of the fbi, and an important institution.

>> if you were king which is something we would only speak about hypothetically and nobody whatever actually really indulge, you would have vetoed kash patel over any others. you would have gotten rid of that confirmation. >> if i had only one, a veto over just one it would have been him. the rest of them are so bad but rfk junior can do a lot of damage. vaccines don't work or whatever it doesn't mean they are going to band vaccines but they will be taken off of the recommendations. tulsi is dangerous because she has access to intelligence but in her position that is much coordinating as it is intel gathering but again if she truly is that concerned, have some other players out there, there's potential of damaging that, most importantly, our allies are starting to fall back, i don't know if we are going to share this sensitive

human intelligence with you because of that so we can see some damage in that way and -- >> on the subset you've been talking about donald trump. you've been talking about a lot of the other forces of ill liberalism both in the united states and around the world, just today germany is having an election or has had an election at this point and i haven't seen the results but everyone is predicting that the furthest right parties that they've had in a wild is going to get around 20% of the vote, how much of this that is happening in the united states where we are talking about things like pro vladimir putinor an autocratic moment, how much of it is donald trump and it is emanating out from the united states and how much of it is something that's broader and the united states is simply one

country swept up in this moment? >> from what we are hearing from germany and it will be tough for them to make the coalition. as far as ukraine is concerned i'm hearing this about the second best option for ukraine that could come out of germany, that's a decent but a fifth of them voted for the nazi party in germany. there's something chilling about that and a lot of it is of this. what i say about donald trump. he is a symptom and a cause. donald trump came to power as a symptom of america wanting to break the system. look back at history, there are cycles. however many years we flirt with fascism, we flirt with that kind of stuff but usually we've had leaders that were responsible enough to say i' m a play with this fire a little bit but also recognize a fire can burn out of control and be really dangerous so they don't because they are grown ups, they recognize that their voice, the things they say have an impact. when you have a serious

megalomaniacal narcissist who literally doesn't care, can't say this enough because it is true. he does not care whether what happens to this country, he cares about himself. if you say you are going to have an amazing two years but american won't exist in four or you can have a bad two years and america will exist in four he said i will take the two you good years, i really believe that. the problem, that's a symptom. the problem is america has a strong leadership role in the world particularly in the conservative movement's i had a conservative mp from the uk i talked to a few years ago the told me, he goes i am concerned because what happens in american conservatism always travels to australia, canada and the uk. i told him first off, that is chilling it, secondly, here's a good lesson for you.

cancer, you can't defeat cancer bike putting good cells around it, you defeat cancer by eradicating it. the idea you can bring the extremists in your party, bring them in and change them never happens. those extremists always change you. you can't say i've got cancer in my body but don't want more good cells than bad cells, i will win out. that's not how it works. is an accelerant. the fact that people are openly supporting the neo-nazi party, the fact that you see these movements all over the planet is largely because he and elon and others have made it okay. >> let me put it this way. what afd get 20% if donald trump was not president of the united states? >> i don't think so and i think -- if, let's say he had lost to harris i don't necessarily know if that would have affected it or not but had donald trump not been in the picture, i think he has normalized what used to be

seen as indecent or shameful or things like that so his presence in general has allowed the afd to feel more emboldened. i am german by dissent. i don't live in germany obviously. i can't necessarily answer that for sure. migration and things like that have had an impact as well but to say 20%, tough to see that being normalized. >> let's stay on foreign policy for one more question. foreign policy foreign policy is a passion of yours. this group is not politically homogenous. we have a lot of disparate interests but if there are some unifying factors it's a sense of decency, a sense of truth but one of the things most common here is support for ukraine. support for ukraine. [applause] >> it is not necessarily because ukraine has done

everything right. it hasn't been the model of liberal democracy over the last 30 years but we would certainly say it is going in those direction and shares, broadly speaking, the same values the united states has stood for. given that we all feel, most of us feel that way and no one will dispute which side we should support, what should people in this room do in furtherance of the ukrainian because at this point? >> i would say it is easy but it is not. the reality of it is if the president has made the decision that we are not going to support ukraine we are not going to. i wish i could force a different answer. there are a few republicans that have the courage to at least tweet that they like ukraine still but they always never mention anything about trump, it is always this discussion about putin is xyz, not like trump shouldn't say

about we should encourage that. i also think of those people should be encouraged to say, don bacon for instance, do you truly believe this is an x essential fight? i do. how about this. it only takes two republicans the shutdown every agenda item, just say no until the president relents and says we won't force ukraine to pass back or we will continue to put out the money that has been appropriated. that's how you play hardball politics. they won't. that is what we have to pressure them for, through their town halls, every one of you that where ukraine flag pin that makes a difference but i have a ukraine flag on my car. everybody that sees the ukraine flag goes he is making a statement. continue to be loud and outspoken matters which i've got to tell you is a congressman that has had townhall meetings and been confronted in townhall meetings and confronted by opponents and townhall meetings, they are

very uncomfortable and very effective because right now republican members of congress fear one person, donald trump. they don't fear you. when they start fearing you, i saphier politically, when they start fearing you, that is when they start having a different calculus of what should i do and what should i say. if you have extra money give to some of these groups and to make sure make sure is the right group because there are some fraudulent charities out there. that is what i would say. but we've got a generation of people just like the united states when we stayed in europe after world war ii, we had war fatigue, when people say screw them, they don't know what they are talking about, tired of seeing it on tv, i'm sorry, we are not even at war but when you see that, and you think of world war ii, we stayed in europe and the third generation of people behind the iron curtain that saw enough of what we live the light, saw enough of what it meant to be an american or what it meant to be french or west german they saw the third generation rose up and they tore down the iron

curtain because they were inspired to want more. our example, not always our military, our example is that example of self-governance and free market and a chance to live and to be who you want to be that the rest of the world is desperate for and when they see it and are motivated by they tear down walls and they do it every time. that is why our role around the world is important beyond the military, beyond the fact we can get minerals from ukraine. it is important because we literally buy our example freed generations of people desperate for that freedom. [applause] >> host: one more question. why do republican members seem to get it with israel? i see these situations as somewhat analogous. of freedom hating group attacks

a group, a country that might be imperfect but largely speaking, cares for the same liberal democratic values we care for and then the attacks country responds to either defend its people or defend its territory, almost every republican in congress supports israel, supports funding for israel, supports letting his real do what it needs to do to secure itself. very few republicans in congress are aggressively outspoken about helping ukraine do the same. why? >> part of it, would have been a good question for russell moore and david french. there is are. 's component to it. this idea that israel can do no wrong, the political pressure that exists and the fact that donald trump supports israel. i honestly think if donald trump would be a huge ukraine supporter every republican will be a ukraine support because they do whatever he wants, literally, it's not because they are good but they do

whatever he wants. there's a huge point to that which sadly is the case. we can disagree with israel on some things, we can disagree with her ukraine on some things but israel was attacked, ukraine, to sit here and say that ukraine started the war, it is crazy and the idea, falling into the trap. but it is crazy, the war could stop this next second if russia simply ceased offensive combat operations, the wars over, that is it, right? i want to say really quickly russians have lost 800,000 men, dead, wounded or captured. we lost 4 or 500,000 in world war ii. we liberated a continent, took down an empire with half of the casualties russia has had to only control 20% of ukrainian territory. don't tell me russia is winning, they are not. they are barely holding on for

dear life and the only one who can save them is donald trump and he is trying to do that. [applause] >> domestic politics in the united states. when people ask me should i run for office, i say get into the game, we need you. and then they asked me for a few recommendations. mostly they are looking for the nuts and bolts of running in a jurisdiction but i tell him one thing, get a notebook and take out an actual pen or not a pencil, pen, and write down your lines in the sand. they might seem obvious to you now but there's going to come a point when you are going to want to open up that notebook, remember your pre-political self because some of those are going to look tempting to cross. are there still lines in the sand for your former colleagues in congress? it seems like each time we had one, january 6th being the most poignant one for me it seems

like those lines get erased out and i'm just hoping there's a line at some point. is there a line? >> i hope so. i don't know anymore. i hate to say that because i want to bring good news and hope and inspiration but when january 6th did, like you said, when that didn't change minds, what is beyond that? if we tried to set up concentration camps may be people would be against it i hope. i don't know what the redline is. the sad thing about that is like you said with the notebook, there are a lot of people i feel bad for except they are creating real damage, someday look in the mirror and be like what have i become. mitch mcconnell is doing that right now by the way. i think i've got a 3-year-old kit and i know when he reaches last name in history books because it's an uncommon last name not going to be able to hide, he is going to be proud but there are a lot of people i

worked with -- [applause] >> there's going to be a lot of people i worked with who aren't going to have that. what lose chairman -- what. cheney said, your shame is eternal. i don't know if there's a redline. i know this. we have the political power to stop this chaos. someday people will have redlines if we demanded but i will say quickly when i ran for congress, this is a god thing because it is the one thing that kept me on line. i came back from iraq and ran for congress and i remember when i announced, saying and thinking, if i'm going to be in a position to fund people to go to war. i'm a little more hawkish so more likely to do that. if i'm going to fund people to go to war, ask young people to give their life or the united states of america. if i'm willing to do that i have to be willing to give up my career and job for the same cause. because i have -- i have no

right, i have no right to salute of flag draped coffin of a 19-year-old that gave his life are this country, literally everything, the ultimate sacrifice can if i'm going to go after saluting that flag go to washington dc and go i should vote no but i have to vote yes because otherwise i might get a primary opponent. i don't care, right? open [applause] >> i wear on my wrist, i wear on my wrist the name of a friend of mine that was killed in iraq in 2018 in a helicopter crash. and i will tell you this guy did not give his life for the country so the bunch of politicians could get reelected. he gave his life for a cause and we can disagree on what that cause is, what the country looks like, that's the beautiful thing about this country but what we can't

disagree on is any politician should ever put their career or their vote above the lives of people they are sending to war because that is unacceptable. [applause] >> 22-year-old stephen out of graduate school was here in washington dc and got swept up in something called the tea party. limited government, heck yes. public schools, a private good, we put a tollroad on every private road. i was happy to go down any sort of libertarian dreamworld you wanted me to. changed a little bit. but i have a lot of those sympathies still. you say you got elected that year, 2010 and you say now on your subset that we are experiencing something of a tea party like a moment, where

there should be out to party like forever that can be tapped into for positive benefit. tell me a little bit about that because again, we are not a homogenous group and i'm going to guess when i say tea party not everyone is here like years, let's go for round 2. >> let's look at, here's an interesting thing, there's tea party of 2010 and then 2012 and on. 2010 was just a bunch of people to stop it government and you would have i had one rally 10,000 people showed up in illinois and then republicans take the majority and the tea party gets shrunk and it has shrunk to basically the crazies that went in because nobody would accept them. as an example in 2010 as a tea party guy i was never told, i never said i would never raise the debt limit, you have to raise the debt limit, that was okay to them. in 2012 that means you are a heretic so that changed. so the lesson is what is important. which is obama is elected president and august, the

equivalent of this year, everybody starts going to these town hall meetings and everything is exploding. it is all over the news, bat catches fire, i used to that against my opponent too and everyone goes to these town hall meetings, it is all over the news, people go to other rallies and protesting offices. that caught fire. by the way, that has already started last week, we are 7 months ahead of that by the way. the difference, the difference is the tea party was based on some ideology, less government, etc. etc. . this is maybe not going to be based directly on ideology because you have more is on the left, the center and the sane right, this is about reclaiming our democracy and i think just as important leaders about saying the guy that is worth $500 billion and is likely to be the first trillion air in this country, in the world and the most powerful man in the

world and i have a right to tell me how to live. our country never intended, i will sound like an occupy wall street person, our country never intended at its founding for somebody worth $500 billion to have any more say than you have even if you are living paycheck to paycheck. you have as much of a right to government as they do and that is going to be the thing that unites us all in this, no. we are taking our country back, because we think we should have a say in government and not a couple people, one who is riddled on ketamine and the other who doesn't think about anything but himself. we believe we should be in charge and that will unite us. after whatever this is takes power there will be debates, that's great, that's called democracy but right now what we have is not democracy and i think this is growing, it is catching fire. in your district, if your

congressman is unwilling to do a town hall, force him to, demand it, make the press demanded of him. when are you going to do a town hall and when they do it make sure you go and let them know how you feel. it's the most miserable experience as a member of congress and it is very effective. [applause] i can say is that now. i used to be i love town halls, now i can be like they suck. >> guest: the 2020 election. >> host: going to ask you that in front of everyone. the answer is no and that wasn't the right answer in those crowds. >> host: all right. you are making into occupy wall street, don't know if that was their hygiene or unlimited government sympathies but something else that makes me itch a little bit but is very well intended from some of the people in this room and phoenix, arizona, will say join the dems, it's the other party.

what are one or two things the dems would really have to improve on for it to be a tantalizing offer to you? >> i don't know if it has to improve on anything. my point is i don't need the democrats to say now we believe more of what you do, what i want, i think they are doing better at this, far better than the republican this is recognition that they are a party - a very recent phenomenon, the parties required you to believe certain things, there was always a variance in the party, remember there used to be liberal republicans, conservative republicans, conservative democrats, a party was a power structure that generally believed the same thing, there were differences in it, the democrats, they accept that and i see democratic party support conservative candidates in red states for instance. i think that is how you build a winning coalition. i may not agree with adams or

stevens on every issue but i do agree on the big issues which is the role of government, the fact that democracy matters and then when you take power you can deal with the inconvenience of disagreeing on issues, and deal with that. >> i know you are not running for office but that sounded like you were pretty open to an invitation. >> guest: from -- i would save this. from our brethren on the left, the party that neither you nor i have ever been part of, that wasn't you need to fix this, this, this, this, that was like just make a big enough tent for me. >> that's it. obviously if i'm sitting down with democratic leaders and i like how should we change our messaging i will have some input, i will have some thoughts but the big thing is just be willing to accept people that are different because that is how you get the 50 one or more, you are not going to get the 51%, you're

not going to get the 50% by saying your view on this is different than ours you don't belong because then okay, wander around and figure how to vote for at that moment, not me but most people. what i ever run again? i would be open to it. what i ever be open to it? what is all like where can i make the most difference and where can the most difference be made. [applause] >> second last question, where can i make a difference? i spent the last four years trying to tell people the 2020 election wasn't stolen and anyone who said otherwise was doing a disqualifying will he bad thing for american democracy. [applause] >> yes, but, yes, but that

obviously didn't win the day in arizona where donald trump won by 100,000 votes. >> are we making an impact? >> great question, look at a broader variety. i understand the feeling. i wrestle with it every day. for you to say i didn't make a difference because trump won arizona, in the short-term you could look at that and say that is accurate but here's the thing. if you had not constantly said the election was not stolen, with all of us saying it too it very well would have been accepted fact now that the election was stolen or there wouldn't be a question in some people's minds and you think about the corrosion on democracy there. i can tell you i believe in four years there's not going to be a single person left that will admit they supported donald trump. my private prediction. all of that is going to be

because even though there is a moment in a storm that's really dark, we let the torch lift, even if the torch is late and barely putting out any light and nobody is paying attention you got to keep that fire going because then when the moment strikes, the clouds clear and light is needed and you've got the fire going. america honest to god is desperate for unity, dry for truth and the fact that people like you kept saying the truth has an impact beyond what happened last election. it will echo for decades so i think we are winning and we will keep winning and ladies and gentlemen, take the burden off your shoulder, be happy, we are all in this together, this is not resting only on your shoulders, we are all doing this. [applause]

>> last question, appreciate your indulgence. it recently came to light that a number of years ago there was a lady in milwaukee who, in an alleyway, was being attacked by a man with a knife and it was a desperate situation but low and behold, adam kinzinger happened to have been there, took the man down, saved the woman's life and she has recently started talking about it so i was hoping for this last little section. i asked the guys i worked with including one of the good guys that put work into this program, did they really have a knife i could borrow and he said all good republicans carry knives. i never even shot a gun. maybe that is why it didn't work out so well.

then he gave me this pocketknife and i don't know if he was trying to emasculate me but it didn't look very threatening and then i took it anyway and i saw the security things, i'm such a -- my hand started sweating bringing the little pocketknife so instead i got this plastic knife and i was hoping you could quickly show what that looks like because i think i could beat you at a game of horse but what does this look like? let's do it. >> all right. we are going to reenact this, first time i ever reenacted this. a lady over there. this is an alleyway. he threw on the ground and tried to cut her head off and then he gets up, she runs over to me and he is following her with a blank look and i'm like debating in my mind, i don't want to do this, i'm going to die. i would fight a guy with a gun before i would fight a guy with

a knife but i remember two thoughts, one was i can't watch this happen to her and live with myself the rest of my life and the other was i'm going to get hurt doing this. she ends of getting a car behind me. and coming after her, i end up i blank out but i see the security camera, grabbed his knife hand and throw my arm around his neck, your neck and at that point i'm fighting for my life and we are grappling and i end up, thank god, got him down. i made the decision to kill him but thankfully didn't do that but that is how it went. >> ladies and gentlemen, adam kinzer gert. [applause]

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