The open conflict between MAGA movement stalwarts at the TPUSA AmericaFest has gotten quite a bit of coverage from the MSM, but very little of the underlying conflict has been reported. <\/p>\n
Let\u2019s set the scene with POTUS Trump\u2019s current abysmal poll numbers:<\/p>\n
\n\ud83d\udcca GALLUP POLL \u2013 Trump Approval <\/p>\n
\ud83d\udfe2 Approve: 36% (-23)
\ud83d\udfe4 Disapprove: 59%
\u2014\u2014
\u2022 Dem: 3-93 (-90)
\u2022 GOP: 89-8 (+81)
\u2022 Indie: 25-68 (-43)
\u2014
\u2022 Ages 18-34: 25-68 (-43)
\u2022 Ages 35-54: 36-59 (-23)
\u2022 Ages 55+: 43-53 (-10)
\u2014
\u2022 No College: 37-55 (-18)
\u2022 College grad: 37-59 (-22)\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/HfE3GOeZSW<\/a><\/p>\n\u2014 InteractivePolls (@IAPolls2022) December 22, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
The Ghost Haunting the Conference<\/strong><\/p>\n
Before I borrow Lambert\u2019s waders and discuss the TPUSA speakers, we have to discuss the absent figure whose spirit dominated the conference.<\/p>\n
And I don\u2019t mean Charlie Kirk.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m talking about Candace Owens, the self-proclaimed most popular podcaster in the world<\/a> (Spotify has her at #8 in the US<\/a>, FWIW), whose absence haunted TPUSA and whose name filled the mouths of many speakers.<\/p>\n
The second paragraph of this the Washington Post op-ed on TPUSA, or as the headline read \u201cA Conference of Clowns<\/a>\u201d confirms Owens\u2019 importance to the proceedings:<\/p>\n
\nNo, the group did not book podcaster Candace Owens, who has spun a seemingly endless variety of conspiracy theories around Kirk\u2019s murder, insisting that the alleged assassin, Tyler Robinson, was merely a pawn of larger, more sinister forces. (In early October<\/a>, Owens claimed that Kirk appeared to her in a dream and told her \u201cthat he was betrayed.\u201d It is very difficult to corroborate her sources.)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
This Michelle Goldberg piece on the NYT op-ed page titled \u201cCandace Owens Is the Conservative Movement\u2019s Frankenstein Monster\u201d<\/a> gives more context, if through a glass darkly:<\/p>\n
\nOwens\u2019s musings are unhinged, but Erika Kirk\u2019s trip to Nashville, brokered by the conservative star Megyn Kelly, demonstrates that they\u2019ve become too influential for right-wing leaders to ignore. Kelly \u2014 a former Fox News host who\u2019d never been known for her outr\u00e9 views \u2014 has refused to denounce Owens, insisting her ideas are legitimate. On her podcast on Tuesday, Kelly said that she buys the official story that Charlie Kirk was murdered by Tyler Robinson, the Utah man charged with the crime. But, she added, \u201cmany people believe there\u2019s more to this story, that we\u2019re being lied to by our F.B.I., that there are too many inconsistencies around the official story. And those people are more than entitled to that belief.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Owens held a multi-hour private one-on-one with Erika Kirk, the sainted widow of TPUSA but came out unrepentant<\/a> thereby earning this Vanity Fair hit piece<\/a>:<\/p>\n
\nFor the last month, Owens has used her YouTube channel\u2014on which she has nearly 5.7 million subscribers\u2014to spin fanciful theories about Charlie\u2019s killing. She has claimed that Israel and France had something to gain from his death and has suggested that other employees of his right-wing organization might have played a role in it too. At first, Owens and Kirk\u2019s Monday summit in Nashville looked like a sign that Owens might ease off the conspiracies, just in time for AmericaFest\u2014TPUSA\u2019s annual summit, which started Thursday and runs through December 21.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
But let\u2019s get into the muck of the conference itself.<\/p>\n
Name Calling on the Sainted Widow\u2019s TPUSA Stage<\/strong><\/p>\n
Despite the best efforts of the right-wing and Ezra Klein<\/a>, the murder of Charlie Kirk<\/a> did not begin a new political era. <\/p>\n
Instead we got a few weeks\u2019 of political<\/a> witchhunts<\/a>, months<\/a> of backlash<\/a>, and a right-wing that is more divided than ever. <\/p>\n
In a contrast to the Bush-era GOP which handled its conflicts behind closed doors<\/a> (except when Pat Buchanan got out of the basement<\/a>), the Trump-era GOP lets it all hang out, on stage, in public, live on TV and streamed on the web from Phoenix, Arizona at what Politico called<\/a> \u201ca weekend-long festival for 30,000 of President Donald Trump\u2019s most ardent supporters.\u201d<\/p>\n
TPUSA hostess, Erika Kirk, the sainted widow of the martyred Charlie, summed it up<\/a> as \u201clike a Thanksgiving dinner where your family\u2019s hashing out the family business.\u201d<\/p>\n
She also warned that (since Charlie Kirk\u2019s death) \u201cwe\u2019ve seen fractures, we\u2019ve seen bridges being burned that shouldn\u2019t be burnt.\u201d<\/p>\n
No word on whether the grieving widow handed out incendiary devices to the speakers but she might as well have.<\/p>\n
Ben Shapiro Kicked It Off<\/strong><\/p>\n
Ben Shapiro opened the TPUSA festivities<\/a> by glazing Mrs. Martyr saying, \u201cIt\u2019s even more of an honor to follow Erika Kirk, a heroic figure and a true American patriot. I really believe that the best way to judge a goodness of a man is to see the goodness of his wife and his children. And on that measure, Charlie was unsurpassed.\u201d <\/p>\n
The MSM coverage has focused<\/a> on his name-calling attacks on Candace Owens (\u201chas been vomiting all sorts of hideous and conspiratorial nonsense into the public square for years\u201d), Steve Bannon (\u201ca PR flack for Jeffrey Epstein), Megyn Kelly (\u201cguilty of cowardice\u201d for not condemning Owens), Tucker Carlson (platforming Nick Fuentes was \u201can act of moral imbecility\u201d) while stripping out the underlying context behind the conflicts.<\/p>\n
Shapiro\u2019s defense of the \u201cgood human beings like (FBI Director) Kash Patel and (Former FBI Deputy Director) Dan Bongino and (Attorney General) Pam Bondi and yes, the President of the United States\u201d also got space in the MSM.<\/p>\n
The WaPo quoted<\/a> Shapiro\u2019s attack on Owens at length: <\/p>\n
\n\u201cIf Candace Owens decides to spend every day since the murder of Charlie Kirk casting aspersions at TPUSA and the people who work here, who worked with Charlie every single day, his best friends \u2026 and, yes, at Erica Kirk and to imply or outright claim complicity in a cover-up over Charlie\u2019s murder, to spew absolutely baseless trash implicating everyone from French intelligence to Mossad to members of TPUSA in Charlie\u2019s murder or a cover-up in that murder, then we as people with a microphone have a moral obligation to call that out by name.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
But I found it much more notable that some of the biggest audience applause during Shapiro\u2019s stage time came when an audience member asked him about Israel\u2019s 1967 attack on the USS Liberty<\/a>. <\/p>\n
Ben responded with \u201cI\u2019m wondering what your motivation is in bringing up a six decade old attack as though it is the number one issue in assessing the relationship between Israel and the United States today\u201d before dismissing the questioner.<\/p>\n
The next speaker wouldn\u2019t be so easily dismissed.<\/p>\n
Carlson Fires Back With First Principles<\/strong><\/p>\n
MSM reports<\/a> have focused on Shapiro\u2019s attacks at much greater length than the responses he got from Tucker Carlson and others. <\/p>\n
But, Carlson\u2019s first night closing slot and the crowd response put the lie to any thought of The Bowtied One being an after thought at TPUSA. <\/p>\n
Tucker Carlson played with his food<\/a> before he went for the kill to the pleasure of (some of) the TPUSA crowd. <\/p>\n
\nTucker Carlson<\/strong>: I just got here and I feel like I missed the first part of the program. Hope I didn\u2019t miss anything meaningful. <\/p>\n
I just want to say I don\u2019t think I did. <\/p>\n
No, I\u2019m just kidding. I watched it. I laughed. I laughed. that kind of bitter sardonic laugh that emerges from you and like upside down world arrives when your dog starts doing your taxes and you\u2019re like, \u2018Wait, it\u2019s not supposed to work this way.\u2019 <\/p>\n
To hear calls for like deplatforming and denouncing people at a Charlie Kirk event, I\u2019m like, \u2018What? This is hilarious.\u2019<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Carlson pulled the scab off of some of the behind the scenes drama, while invoking the Martyr\u2019s name and his purported primary value \u2014 free speech:<\/p>\n
\nCarlson<\/strong>: (Free speech) was the whole point of Charlie Kirk\u2019s public life. And I think that I think that he died for it. I really believe that. I know a lot about it because the last several months of Charlie\u2019s life were devoted in part to arguing about this event. <\/p>\n
In fact, my speech here, which (Kirk) asked me to do earlier this year, this summer, and he was immediately put under just immense pressure from people who give money to Turning Point, I would assume good people, but who wanted him to take me off the roster. <\/p>\n
And this has all become public and I the whole thing is so sad that I never talk about it except to say Charlie stood firm in his often stated and deeply held belief that people should be able to debate and that if you have something valid to say if you\u2019re telling the truth, you ought to be able to explain it calmly and in detail to people who don\u2019t agree with you and that you shouldn\u2019t immediately resort to \u2018Shut up racist.\u2019 <\/p>\n
You shouldn\u2019t immediately go to motive. By the way, \u2018Shut up, racist\u2019 is the number one reason I voted for Donald Trump.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Carlson went on to denounce anti-Semitism, anti-white racism (\u201cThat is precisely as bad as anti-Semitism, but it is much more widespread and has been so far much more damaging\u201d), identity politics (ironically in light of the previous quote), \u201ccollective punishment\u201d in the Middle East, but the part I want to share at length is his diagnosis of the dynamic driving the conflict at TPUSA:<\/p>\n
\nCarlson<\/strong>: Let me just say something more broadly about where the conservative movement, whatever that is, the people who voted for Trump, the Trump coalition, the supposed civil war going on within that group. <\/p>\n
I don\u2019t think it\u2019s real. I think it\u2019s fake. I think it\u2019s totally fake. <\/p>\n
And I\u2019ve had cause to think a lot about this because I\u2019ve been unwittingly involved in the proxy war. <\/p>\n
There are two things going on here and I\u2019m not guessing. <\/p>\n
One is jockeying for position post Trump. So Trump created this amazing coalition bringing in people who had never voted Republican before but were very enthusiastic about him. <\/p>\n
And that coalition took over the most powerful government in the history of the world. So there\u2019s a lot lot at stake here. <\/p>\n
And so the question becomes who gets to run it after? Who gets the machinery when the president exits the scene? <\/p>\n
There are a lot of people in Washington, maybe even in this room, who aren\u2019t quite sure what they want, but they know they don\u2019t want J.D. Vance. Okay? <\/p>\n
And so the attack, and you heard it from the stage tonight, \u2018There\u2019s someone here who\u2019s a very bad man, and he\u2019s friends with J.D. Vance.\u2019<\/p>\n
Could be me. <\/p>\n
I am sad about being used in a proxy war over politics in which I\u2019m not involved in any level. I\u2019m not adviser to anybody. But I just think I should say that out loud. <\/p>\n
Okay, there are people who are mad at J.D. Vance and they\u2019re stirring up a lot of this in order to make sure he doesn\u2019t get the nominations that this is true. <\/p>\n
So this raises the obvious question which is why are they mad at J.D. Vance? Such a nice guy which he is. They\u2019re mad at J.D. Vance because he is the one person\u2026right now who really kind of buys the core idea of the Trump coalition. <\/p>\n
Now, what is that idea, ladies and gentlemen? Anyone know? Anyone know? America first.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
After a spirited defense of the America first concept Carlson launched into an elliptical defense of Nick Fuentes before going on the offense against their mutual enemies:<\/p>\n
\nCarlson<\/strong>: I would also call your attention to the very obvious prohibitions in the New Testament against killing the innocent. <\/p>\n
We are not as Christians allowed to kill the innocent. Period. We are not. And you see elaborate arguments on behalf of doing so or ignoring it. <\/p>\n
\u2018Oh, that always happens in war.\u2019<\/p>\n
Well, you\u2019re right. One of the reasons I\u2019m not that into wars. But when it does happen unavoidably, we have to say that\u2019s wrong. We have to say that. We have to acknowledge that was wrong and (say) I\u2019m sorry for the extent to which I participated in it. <\/p>\n
Forgive me because killing people who committed no crime is immoral. It will always be immoral. <\/p>\n
And people who do it will be punished for it. And nations that endorse it will be punished for it. That\u2019s a fact. <\/p>\n
And you are seeing now, you are seeing now a very intense effort to convince you otherwise. <\/p>\n
\u2018Oh, it\u2019s fine. They deserved it.\u2019<\/p>\n
Really? Do their children deserve it? If a man commits a crime, do we kill his kids? <\/p>\n
I don\u2019t care if it\u2019s in Minneapolis or Gaza City. No, we don\u2019t. <\/p>\n
And if we do accidentally, we say, \u2018I am so sorry that we murdered someone who did nothing wrong.\u2019 <\/p>\n
Because it is murder. And to see Christian pastors make excuses for that is one of the most and that\u2019s not a partisan question. That is not a political question. That is the only question that matters. <\/p>\n
Do we have the right to murder people? And the resounding answer that Christianity provides us is no.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
The MSM had no interest in that portion of Carlson\u2019s TPUSA speech.<\/p>\n
Steve Bannon\u2019s Uncomfortable Truths About the 12 Day War<\/strong><\/p>\n
Steve Bannon, the self-styled Thomas Cromwell<\/a>\/Vladimir Lenin<\/a> of the MAGA movement, spoke the next day<\/a> and was not intimidated by Shapiro.<\/p>\n
Bannon wasted no time in reminding the TPUSA audience that Shapiro had been a \u201cNever Trumper\u201d in 2016, \u201cbarely supported\u201d Trump in the general election and was \u201cthe very first individual that jumped on the Ron DeSantis train, the Israel first train.\u201d<\/p>\n
The MSM has covered Bannon\u2019s name-calling of Ben \u201che\u2019s a cancer\u201d Shapiro<\/a> at TPUSA but without context, as always. <\/p>\n
Let\u2019s get back to what Bannon actually said at TPUSA.<\/p>\n
Bannon went on, invoking the Sacred Martyr\u2019s name, to scattered applause and some gasps from the TPUSA crowd: <\/p>\n
\nSteve Bannon<\/strong>: The Israel first crowd is Ben Shapiro, \u201cTel Aviv\u201d Mark Levin, and many others that want to put (Israel) ahead of America\u2019s interests. Charlie Kirk fought that. You know where Charlie Kirk fought it? In the White House. I know because I was there. Charlie Kirk was working with (US Ambassador to Indis) Sergio Gor<\/a>, certain people around the vice president to make sure that that we didn\u2019t get sucked into a land war, a decapitation of the Iranian elites that would lead to a massive civil war that American troops would get sucked into because that was Netanyahu\u2019s plan from the beginning.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Bannon went on to describe the 12 Day War between Israel and Iran in terms that will be familiar to any listener of Judge Napolitano<\/a>, but that remain verboten in the MSM:<\/p>\n
\nWe know that The Times of Israel has published<\/a> that there was no urgency to go after (Iran\u2019s) nuclear weapons. <\/p>\n
We know the fact (Israel) couldn\u2019t finish what they started. We know for a fact we know for a fact that they had they needed American Aegis missiles<\/a> (and) Patriots to defend themselves. <\/p>\n
On day 10 of the war they were losing and they didn\u2019t have the offensive capability, And I don\u2019t mean the B2s coming in and taking out the (Iranian) caves. (Israel) relied upon our 1970s technology of cruise missiles fired from submarines in the North Arabian Sea to take out the above ground (Iranian missles). We had to bring that war to conclusion. <\/p>\n
And President Trump in his brilliance said, \u2018We\u2019ll do that and we\u2019ll call it the 12-day war and it\u2019s over.\u2019 <\/p>\n
Now, the Israel first crowd, they are the ones that are destroying Israel.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Only then did Bannon get to the part that got picked up in the MSM, here\u2019s the \u201cBen Shapiro is a cancer\u201d riff in context.<\/p>\n
After describing the role of Breitbart (which Bannon ran at the time) in the 2016 election of Trump and reminding TPUSA attendees that Shapiro called them \u201cTrump Pravda\u201d at the time, he goes for the kill:<\/p>\n
\nBen Shapiro is like a cancer and that cancer spreads. It\u2019s a cancer and it metastasizes. He tried to take over Breitbart and I ran him out of there. <\/p>\n
He tried to take over David Horowitz\u2019 (Freedom Center) \u2026 <\/p>\n
Don\u2019t ask me. Ask the guys associated with David Horowitz what he did there. He tried to take that over. <\/p>\n
And mark my word, he will make a move on Turning Point because he\u2019s always been envious of Charlie Kirk. This is not about speech. It\u2019s not about deplatforming. This is about power politics.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Readers will forgive me for missing parts of the TPUSA livestream to watch celebrity boxing for my other gig<\/a>, so I\u2019m not entirely sure when Megyn Kelly took the stage for an interview with Jack Posobiec<\/a>, but we\u2019ll cover her part after a brief detour.<\/p>\n
Nationalist Red Meat the Background Noise at TPUSA<\/strong><\/p>\n
I don\u2019t want readers to think I\u2019m losing the forest for the trees so let me include this quote from Posobiec, via Vanity Fair<\/a>, to give a feel for the underlying dynamic at TPUSA:<\/p>\n
\nJack Posobiec, known for promoting the \u201cPizzaGate\u201d conspiracy theory, spoke in histrionics about the fight against political opponents. \u201cWe are up against radical Marxist domestic terrorism, and they are going to keep shooting us until they are stopped,\u201d he said. \u201cThe only thing that stops the bully is a show of force,\u201d concurred Posobiec\u2019s co-host. Posobiec added that \u201cleftists\u201d are not interested in conversation. \u201cIf that means that we can\u2019t play nice, then we\u2019re not gonna play nice.\u201d The crowd cheered. The co-host clarified that they were not encouraging violence. \u201cWe are not an extrajudicial people,\u201d he said. The crowd went quiet.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Ok, perspective restored, let\u2019s get back to the breaking news from TPUSA.<\/p>\n
Megyn Kelly Gets the Camel\u2019s Nose Under the MSM Tent<\/strong><\/p>\n
Here\u2019s a juicy morsel from the Posobiec-Kelly interview:<\/p>\n
\nJack Posobiec<\/strong>: Do you think that there has been an inseparable rift in the conservative movement that we\u2019ve seen since the death of Charlie?<\/p>\n
Megyn Kelly<\/strong>: I mean, there\u2019s a rift, but it was starting even before we lost Charlie, and it revolves around Israel. <\/p>\n
Um, there just is. It\u2019s gotten worse without him. He was helping us navigate it. <\/p>\n
And this is another area in which I miss him so much because I feel like Charlie and I were completely in lock step on this. <\/p>\n
And you guys may have seen the episode that we put out<\/a>, what we re-released of Charlie and yours truly talking about Israel weeks before he died where we had a really powerful heart-to-heart on where we both were. <\/p>\n
We were both ardent Israel supporters\u2026then we had a discussion at the Student Action Summit in July where there was a passing comment about if Epstein was an intel asset, whose would he have been, which Charlie asked me. <\/p>\n
And I said it would make sense that it was the Israelis since he was very close with the former prime minister and um the former president. And then we both got called anti-Semites by some legitimate Jewish organizations for that conversation\u2026and we were both on our heels.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
The same Vanity Fair article quoted above<\/a> has two more paragraph that reveals why the fights at TPUSA matter so much:<\/p>\n
\nA young couple I spoke with had traveled from Waco, Texas, for the event. After a while, Dan, the husband, brought up Israel. A Baptist like his wife, he grew up immersed in evangelical zeal for Zionism. \u201cAs a Baptist, I was taught that supporting Israel is biblical, so supporting it during difficult times seemed straightforward,\u201d he said. Now they\u2019re both questioning Republicans\u2019 unequivocal support for the country. \u201cThe Ted Cruz interview was a turning point for me,\u201d said his wife, referring to Tucker Carlson\u2019s interrogation of the Texas senator, who struggled to explain his support for Israel.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat Charlie and I saw at the same time was that the country is turning,\u201d Kelly said. \u201cAnd young Republicans are turning on Israel.\u201d She argued that figures like Shapiro and Weiss are actually fueling the rise of antisemitism through their attempts to censor criticism of Israel. \u201cThey are making antisemites,\u201d she said. \u201cTucker is not making antisemites. They are.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
If that is the climax of our look at TPUSA, the Vice-President delivered the anti-climax.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m Sorry Did the Vice-President Say Something?<\/strong><\/p>\n
The bearded boy from Appalachia got the closing slot. Here\u2019s his full remarks<\/a>.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll let an image grab of headlines from Google News serve in lieu of another 1000 words in this already over-long piece:<\/p>\n
\npic.twitter.com\/Y4rMt5VO01<\/a><\/p>\n
\u2014 Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) December 23, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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