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Glenn's Show Prep

Glenn interviews Surging Santorum Glenn interviews Surging Santorum

February 09, 2012
Wilson

Writer

GLENN: Rick Santorum in the hot seat. Why were they putting their hands all over you yesterday? Rick Santorum, a bunch of pastors, what is up with that?

SANTORUM: You know, it's ‑‑ I know this sounds very foreign to some people but it's called prayer.

PAT: Oh, wow. What about the separation of church and state? Wow.

GLENN: So Rick Santorum, you're admitting that you're in some sort of prayer cult.

SANTORUM: Yeah, believe it or not, I do, in fact, pray and I actually, you know, asked people to pray for me.

PAT: So how about ‑‑ I mean, obviously we've been praying for you and I've been rooting for you the whole time and something good happened the other day. Uh, you just came out of the blue and wrecked the field.

GLENN: How do you explain that? Explain yourself, Rick Santorum.

PAT: Back on the hot seat now.

SANTORUM: Well, you know, the message began ‑‑ was resonating. I mean, we went out to try to, not to spend the money at the time in the states where the campaigns have been, you know, really locked down for a long time in Nevada and Florida and we went out to the place where, you know, you didn't have these millions of dollars being spent tearing candidates apart and we went to the folks in Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado and delivered a message and the response was just awesome. You know, people realize that we need a candidate that's going to make Barack Obama the issue in this campaign, and Gingrich and Romney tearing each other are apart, not talking about the issues. And the reason they don't talk about the issues, people began to figure it out, is because on the big issues of the day, they don't actually disagree with each other or Obama. And that's the problem.

GLENN: So Rick, where do you ‑‑ where are you going from here? What ‑‑ what do the polls look like for, is Super Tuesday is the next event, isn't it?

SANTORUM: Well, no. There's Michigan and Arizona coming up at the end of the month and then the following week there is Super Tuesday. I went to Texas yesterday and had a great day there. Big rally, you know, thousands of people. I just came, just walked out of a rally in Oklahoma City here. I don't know how many thousand people were there but it was ‑‑ it was a great venue. We feel very, very good. We're on our way to Tulsa. And Oklahoma is a Super Tuesday state and we believe that this will be a state we will do very, very well in and, in fact, I believe this is a state we can win and we're going to put a lot of effort here.

GLENN: Give me the ‑‑ your take. I don't think we've talked to you since the Catholic church has come under attack and you're the biggest Papist we know. I mean, this is not an attack on life.

SANTORUM: No.

GLENN: This is not an attack on the Catholic church. What is this an attack on?

SANTORUM: This is an attack on the First Amendment, this is an attack on religious liberty, this is an attack on freedom of speech. I was just out with the military, he said the U.S. Army made them stop them from talking to their chaplains talking to their people in the pews and made them ‑‑ ended a message that they called seditious from the Catholic church. I mean, this is ‑‑ what I've been saying and you've been saying, Glenn, for a long time. This is not just about our economic freedom, and ObamaCare and Dodd/Frank and all those government takeovers from the different sectors of our economy. When government says that they can create a right from you, for you, then the government can tell you how to exercise that right and if you don't do it, they'll punish you. Catholic charities, I was told if they don't do and provide that service for the ‑‑ for their people which is specifically against the teachings of the church, they will be fined $150 million. That's $150 million from people who would otherwise be given care by Catholic charities and in their mission work who are getting, now are going to pay tribute to Barack Obama. You say this all the time and you are so right. The real intolerance, the real intolerance in America are those on the left, those who say that you will do what you are told to do, there is no freedom. Look, the First Amendment came about because we are a Judeo‑Christian country and we believe the dignity of every person and that person has the right to have free exercise of basic God‑given rights. The left doesn't believe in God‑given rights. They believe in their right to tell you what to do.

GLENN: This to me is the Niemöller moment. This is the moment where first they came for whomever and I didn't say anything.

SANTORUM: Yeah. Yeah.

GLENN: Do you believe that? Because that's quite a charge to make.

SANTORUM: No, it is, it is ‑‑ I mean, I wish you'd have heard my speech here in Oklahoma City. That's exactly what I said, that this is not a Catholic issue. This is not a religious issue. This is not a faith issue. This is an issue of the role and the power of government over the people to command them to think the way the government tells you to think and to be what the government tells you to do, which is against your conscience, which is against your right of speech. This is not just about economic freedom anymore. This is about government and its power and control over its people.

GLENN: The federal government is now saying that if you are ‑‑ if you are involved in ministry at all, if you went to school and you're a priest or a pastor or anything and you have federal loans and you are in ministry at all, you don't get the federal pass that they're offering to everybody else. Why do you suppose they're doing that, Rick?

SANTORUM: Well, probably the same reason they tried to eliminate the deductions for charitable organizations. You know, this is an attack, Glenn, and I know you talk about this. In my book it takes a family, I talk a lot about something called mediating institutions in our society. I talk about the importance of having these civic and community and faith organizations, the family itself. As organizations that are in and around the individual, that help the individual buffer from the effect of government and help the individual to be able to live and solve and work and solve the problems at a level that is closest to the individual and so it creates this opportunity to build a great society from the bottom up because you have all of these little, you know, little mediating groups that help you to be able to be free and to pursue your dreams and provide for yourself and your family. The government sees these as problems in our society because they have values that don't comport with the government's values and so they systematically try to eliminate them. And that's faith and family and civic organizations. This is ‑‑ these are the problems in society, from the standpoint of the left. And what you see is it's nothing more than an attempt to hollow out the public square, hollow out the entities between the all‑powerful state and the individual. And the more direct reliance upon the state that the individual has, of course, the more power the state has.

GLENN: Rick, I ‑‑ we were just talking about this the other day and I said, I'm not sure if I've had an in‑depth conversation with you on, you know, the Tides Foundation and, you know, the role that George Soros is playing and I have had one with Romney and he just doesn't go there. And he's like, I don't know. He doesn't necessarily, at least it is my feeling that he doesn't believe that the, you know, these radicals in our universities and around the White House, that they're actually communist revolutionaries that do want to destroy America. He pretty much dismisses them. Where do you stand on that?

SANTORUM: Well, look. I mean, I'm going to try to be as neutral on this as possible. They want to change America. They want to change America from its founding principles. They want to change America to a statist model. They believe that Europe has it right, that as you heard Justice Ginsburg the other day speak and talk about how no country that's establishing a constitution right now should have the ‑‑ should model themselves after the American Constitution, it's an antiquated document. You know, go to the South African Constitution. That's how the left looks at it, that the United States is sort of a, you know, it's ‑‑

GLENN: So you're ‑‑ I don't mean to interrupt you. So you're ‑‑ what you're saying is that you don't believe that these are dangerous revolutionaries; they are people that we disagree with ‑‑

STU: Yeah, and you're not talking about Barack Obama. You're not ‑‑

GLENN: Yeah, I'm talking about the Bill Ayers of the people.

SANTORUM: Oh, no. If you're talking about Bill Ayers and George Soros, they're radicals. These are folks who fundamentally want to ‑‑ want to change America to a country that is ‑‑ that is nothing like what America was built upon because they think it's foundationally flawed and they want to destroy the very premise of this country.

GLENN: And Barack Obama is different how?

SANTORUM: Barack Obama is different in my opinion in approach and degree.

GLENN: Okay.

STU: Mmm‑hmmm.

GLENN: All right. Rick, the best of luck to you and I think you're doing a ‑‑ I mean, that was a ‑‑ I think that was a miracle. I mean, you know, what was it? Four months ago you had 1% approval rating.

SANTORUM: Yeah.

GLENN: And now you're doing this. I think it's ‑‑ I think it speaks highly of the message and also the American people that they are saying, you know what? I think I want somebody who is plain spoken and will just tell me the truth and tell me how he feels and ‑‑

STU: How do you see this internally, Rick? Is it something where you see for a long time there's been this debate about electability or some political calculation with everyone's vote. Are you seeing now that you think that maybe messages is trumping that, or are they just seeing you now all of a sudden as someone who can actually beat Barack Obama?

SANTORUM: I think it's a combination of both because the message is what's going to beat Barack Obama.

PAT: Yeah.

SANTORUM: You know, Mitt Romney's whole claim to fame was I've got the most money and therefore I'm going to win and so you should be for me. And, of course, you're not going to have the most money against Barack Obama. He's not going to be able to outspend his opponent five to one and beat their brains in and, you know, the questions I gave to reporters in the last 24 hours, Glenn, you know what they are? You know, are you ready for the attack dogs? It's not on policy. It's like, you know, Romney's going to destroy you. Wow. I mean, that's the best that Mitt Romney has. I'm going to go out and tear you apart. And, you know, whoever's in my way. Well, guess what. When it comes to Barack Obama, he's not going to have the resources to tear Barack Obama apart. Obama's going to have more resources than he is, and they're going to have the ‑‑ they're going to have the national media on their side and we'd better have the issues on our side. We'd better have a vision for this country that motivates the Republican base and gets the independents to believe that there's a better future than Barack Obama. We don't need a technocrat manager. We need someone with a vision and that's not Romney.

GLENN: Let me ‑‑ I'm going to give you a second to say your website because you always do anyway. So I'm going to invite you to say it here in a second.

SANTORUM: RickSantorum.com.

GLENN: Let me just ask you this because I know you won't answer it the other way. So let me rephrase it this way. Would you ‑‑ in the end if it was politically the best thing to do, would you accept Mitt Romney as your vice presidential candidate?

SANTORUM: Uh, what I'm going to do with my vice presidential candidate, because I'm not going to count on any names, I'm going to put the person in there who I believe so ‑‑

GLENN: Yeah, I know you will. Yeah, I know you will, yeah, blah, blah‑blah. But what I'm asking you ‑‑

SANTORUM: Blah, blah, blah, wait a minute.

GLENN: I'm asking you, is there so much bad blood between you, is there bad blood between you?

SANTORUM: I'm not going to talk about names. I'm going to talk about who, the person who would do what I ‑‑ who would follow through with what I believe, what I told the American public I would do. That's what ‑‑

GLENN: So you're saying Mitt Romney won't do that?

STU: (Laughing.)

GLENN: When did you stop beating your wife?

SANTORUM: I love you, Glenn. I love you, Glenn.

GLENN: All right. Go ahead. Say your website.

SANTORUM: All right. RickSantorum.com. Thank you. And by the way, one of the reasons we've done so well is because we've had folks like you out here on the radio, you know, preparing the battlefield for us. And I really mean that.

GLENN: Well ‑‑

SANTORUM: I just, I thank you so much for being out there and ‑‑

GLENN: We just ‑‑

SANTORUM: You know, letting ‑‑ planting the seeds out there. We're trying to germinate them.

GLENN: If you become president, all we need is, you know, special, you know, healthcare exceptions and things like that. That's all we ‑‑

STU: I would really like to be ambassador to Bermuda.

SANTORUM: You'll be one of the elites that I take care of.

GLENN: Oh, good. I just want to be a czar of some sort.

SANTORUM: Whatever you call it, whatever you want.

GLENN: Rick, appreciate it. Thanks so much. RickSantorum.com.

Is the U.N. plotting to control 30% of U.S. land by 2030?

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

A reliable conservative senator faces cancellation for listening to voters. But the real threat to public lands comes from the last president’s backdoor globalist agenda.

Something ugly is unfolding on social media, and most people aren’t seeing it clearly. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) — one of the most constitutionally grounded conservatives in Washington — is under fire for a housing provision he first proposed in 2022.

You wouldn’t know that from scrolling through X. According to the latest online frenzy, Lee wants to sell off national parks, bulldoze public lands, gut hunting and fishing rights, and hand America’s wilderness to Amazon, BlackRock, and the Chinese Communist Party. None of that is true.

Lee’s bill would have protected against the massive land-grab that’s already under way — courtesy of the Biden administration.

I covered this last month. Since then, the backlash has grown into something like a political witch hunt — not just from the left but from the right. Even Donald Trump Jr., someone I typically agree with, has attacked Lee’s proposal. He’s not alone.

Time to look at the facts the media refuses to cover about Lee’s federal land plan.

What Lee actually proposed

Over the weekend, Lee announced that he would withdraw the federal land sale provision from his housing bill. He said the decision was in response to “a tremendous amount of misinformation — and in some cases, outright lies,” but also acknowledged that many Americans brought forward sincere, thoughtful concerns.

Because of the strict rules surrounding the budget reconciliation process, Lee couldn’t secure legally enforceable protections to ensure that the land would be made available “only to American families — not to China, not to BlackRock, and not to any foreign interests.” Without those safeguards, he chose to walk it back.

That’s not selling out. That’s leadership.

It's what the legislative process is supposed to look like: A senator proposes a bill, the people respond, and the lawmaker listens. That was once known as representative democracy. These days, it gets you labeled a globalist sellout.

The Biden land-grab

To many Americans, “public land” brings to mind open spaces for hunting, fishing, hiking, and recreation. But that’s not what Sen. Mike Lee’s bill targeted.

His proposal would have protected against the real land-grab already under way — the one pushed by the Biden administration.

In 2021, Biden launched a plan to “conserve” 30% of America’s lands and waters by 2030. This effort follows the United Nations-backed “30 by 30” initiative, which seeks to place one-third of all land and water under government control.

Ask yourself: Is the U.N. focused on preserving your right to hunt and fish? Or are radical environmentalists exploiting climate fears to restrict your access to American land?

Smith Collection/Gado / Contributor | Getty Images

As it stands, the federal government already owns 640 million acres — nearly one-third of the entire country. At this rate, the government will hit that 30% benchmark with ease. But it doesn’t end there. The next phase is already in play: the “50 by 50” agenda.

That brings me to a piece of legislation most Americans haven’t even heard of: the Sustains Act.

Passed in 2023, the law allows the federal government to accept private funding from organizations, such as BlackRock or the Bill Gates Foundation, to support “conservation programs.” In practice, the law enables wealthy elites to buy influence over how American land is used and managed.

Moreover, the government doesn’t even need the landowner’s permission to declare that your property contributes to “pollination,” or “photosynthesis,” or “air quality” — and then regulate it accordingly. You could wake up one morning and find out that the land you own no longer belongs to you in any meaningful sense.

Where was the outrage then? Where were the online crusaders when private capital and federal bureaucrats teamed up to quietly erode private property rights across America?

American families pay the price

The real danger isn’t in Mike Lee’s attempt to offer more housing near population centers — land that would be limited, clarified, and safeguarded in the final bill. The real threat is the creeping partnership between unelected global elites and our own government, a partnership designed to consolidate land, control rural development, and keep Americans penned in so-called “15-minute cities.”

BlackRock buying entire neighborhoods and pricing out regular families isn’t by accident. It’s part of a larger strategy to centralize populations into manageable zones, where cars are unnecessary, rural living is unaffordable, and every facet of life is tracked, regulated, and optimized.

That’s the real agenda. And it’s already happening , and Mike Lee’s bill would have been an effort to ensure that you — not BlackRock, not China — get first dibs.

I live in a town of 451 people. Even here, in the middle of nowhere, housing is unaffordable. The American dream of owning a patch of land is slipping away, not because of one proposal from a constitutional conservative, but because global powers and their political allies are already devouring it.

Divide and conquer

This controversy isn’t really about Mike Lee. It’s about whether we, as a nation, are still capable of having honest debates about public policy — or whether the online mob now controls the narrative. It’s about whether conservatives will focus on facts or fall into the trap of friendly fire and circular firing squads.

More importantly, it’s about whether we’ll recognize the real land-grab happening in our country — and have the courage to fight back before it’s too late.


This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

URGENT: FIVE steps to CONTROL AI before it's too late!

MANAURE QUINTERO / Contributor | Getty Images

By now, many of us are familiar with AI and its potential benefits and threats. However, unless you're a tech tycoon, it can feel like you have little influence over the future of artificial intelligence.

For years, Glenn has warned about the dangers of rapidly developing AI technologies that have taken the world by storm.

He acknowledges their significant benefits but emphasizes the need to establish proper boundaries and ethics now, while we still have control. But since most people aren’t Silicon Valley tech leaders making the decisions, how can they help keep AI in check?

Recently, Glenn interviewed Tristan Harris, a tech ethicist deeply concerned about the potential harm of unchecked AI, to discuss its societal implications. Harris highlighted a concerning new piece of legislation proposed by Texas Senator Ted Cruz. This legislation proposes a state-level moratorium on AI regulation, meaning only the federal government could regulate AI. Harris noted that there’s currently no Federal plan for regulating AI. Until the federal government establishes a plan, tech companies would have nearly free rein with their AI. And we all know how slowly the federal government moves.

This is where you come in. Tristan Harris shared with Glenn the top five actions you should urge your representatives to take regarding AI, including opposing the moratorium until a concrete plan is in place. Now is your chance to influence the future of AI. Contact your senator and congressman today and share these five crucial steps they must take to keep AI in check:

Ban engagement-optimized AI companions for kids

Create legislation that will prevent AI from being designed to maximize addiction, sexualization, flattery, and attachment disorders, and to protect young people’s mental health and ability to form real-life friendships.

Establish basic liability laws

Companies need to be held accountable when their products cause real-world harm.

Pass increased whistleblower protections

Protect concerned technologists working inside the AI labs from facing untenable pressures and threats that prevent them from warning the public when the AI rollout is unsafe or crosses dangerous red lines.

Prevent AI from having legal rights

Enact laws so AIs don’t have protected speech or have their own bank accounts, making sure our legal system works for human interests over AI interests.

Oppose the state moratorium on AI 

Call your congressman or Senator Cruz’s office, and demand they oppose the state moratorium on AI without a plan for how we will set guardrails for this technology.

Glenn: Only Trump dared to deliver on decades of empty promises

Tasos Katopodis / Stringer | Getty Images

The Islamic regime has been killing Americans since 1979. Now Trump’s response proves we’re no longer playing defense — we’re finally hitting back.

The United States has taken direct military action against Iran’s nuclear program. Whatever you think of the strike, it’s over. It’s happened. And now, we have to predict what happens next. I want to help you understand the gravity of this situation: what happened, what it means, and what might come next. To that end, we need to begin with a little history.

Since 1979, Iran has been at war with us — even if we refused to call it that.

We are either on the verge of a remarkable strategic victory or a devastating global escalation. Time will tell.

It began with the hostage crisis, when 66 Americans were seized and 52 were held for over a year by the radical Islamic regime. Four years later, 17 more Americans were murdered in the U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut, followed by 241 Marines in the Beirut barracks bombing.

Then came the Khobar Towers bombing in 1996, which killed 19 more U.S. airmen. Iran had its fingerprints all over it.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, Iranian-backed proxies killed hundreds of American soldiers. From 2001 to 2020 in Afghanistan and 2003 to 2011 in Iraq, Iran supplied IEDs and tactical support.

The Iranians have plotted assassinations and kidnappings on U.S. soil — in 2011, 2021, and again in 2024 — and yet we’ve never really responded.

The precedent for U.S. retaliation has always been present, but no president has chosen to pull the trigger until this past weekend. President Donald Trump struck decisively. And what our military pulled off this weekend was nothing short of extraordinary.

Operation Midnight Hammer

The strike was reportedly called Operation Midnight Hammer. It involved as many as 175 U.S. aircraft, including 12 B-2 stealth bombers — out of just 19 in our entire arsenal. Those bombers are among the most complex machines in the world, and they were kept mission-ready by some of the finest mechanics on the planet.

USAF / Handout | Getty Images

To throw off Iranian radar and intelligence, some bombers flew west toward Guam — classic misdirection. The rest flew east, toward the real targets.

As the B-2s approached Iranian airspace, U.S. submarines launched dozens of Tomahawk missiles at Iran’s fortified nuclear facilities. Minutes later, the bombers dropped 14 MOPs — massive ordnance penetrators — each designed to drill deep into the earth and destroy underground bunkers. These bombs are the size of an F-16 and cost millions of dollars apiece. They are so accurate, I’ve been told they can hit the top of a soda can from 15,000 feet.

They were built for this mission — and we’ve been rehearsing this run for 15 years.

If the satellite imagery is accurate — and if what my sources tell me is true — the targeted nuclear sites were utterly destroyed. We’ll likely rely on the Israelis to confirm that on the ground.

This was a master class in strategy, execution, and deterrence. And it proved that only the United States could carry out a strike like this. I am very proud of our military, what we are capable of doing, and what we can accomplish.

What comes next

We don’t yet know how Iran will respond, but many of the possibilities are troubling. The Iranians could target U.S. forces across the Middle East. On Monday, Tehran launched 20 missiles at U.S. bases in Qatar, Syria, and Kuwait, to no effect. God forbid, they could also unleash Hezbollah or other terrorist proxies to strike here at home — and they just might.

Iran has also threatened to shut down the Strait of Hormuz — the artery through which nearly a fifth of the world’s oil flows. On Sunday, Iran’s parliament voted to begin the process. If the Supreme Council and the ayatollah give the go-ahead, we could see oil prices spike to $150 or even $200 a barrel.

That would be catastrophic.

The 2008 financial collapse was pushed over the edge when oil hit $130. Western economies — including ours — simply cannot sustain oil above $120 for long. If this conflict escalates and the Strait is closed, the global economy could unravel.

The strike also raises questions about regime stability. Will it spark an uprising, or will the Islamic regime respond with a brutal crackdown on dissidents?

Early signs aren’t hopeful. Reports suggest hundreds of arrests over the weekend and at least one dissident executed on charges of spying for Israel. The regime’s infamous morality police, the Gasht-e Ershad, are back on the streets. Every phone, every vehicle — monitored. The U.S. embassy in Qatar issued a shelter-in-place warning for Americans.

Russia and China both condemned the strike. On Monday, a senior Iranian official flew to Moscow to meet with Vladimir Putin. That meeting should alarm anyone paying attention. Their alliance continues to deepen — and that’s a serious concern.

Now we pray

We are either on the verge of a remarkable strategic victory or a devastating global escalation. Time will tell. But either way, President Trump didn’t start this. He inherited it — and he took decisive action.

The difference is, he did what they all said they would do. He didn’t send pallets of cash in the dead of night. He didn’t sign another failed treaty.

He acted. Now, we pray. For peace, for wisdom, and for the strength to meet whatever comes next.


This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Globalize the Intifada? Why Mamdani’s plan spells DOOM for America

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

If New Yorkers hand City Hall to Zohran Mamdani, they’re not voting for change. They’re opening the door to an alliance of socialism, Islamism, and chaos.

It only took 25 years for New York City to go from the resilient, flag-waving pride following the 9/11 attacks to a political fever dream. To quote Michael Malice, “I'm old enough to remember when New Yorkers endured 9/11 instead of voting for it.”

Malice is talking about Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist assemblyman from Queens now eyeing the mayor’s office. Mamdani, a 33-year-old state representative emerging from relative political obscurity, is now receiving substantial funding for his mayoral campaign from the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

CAIR has a long and concerning history, including being born out of the Muslim Brotherhood and named an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror funding case. Why would the group have dropped $100,000 into a PAC backing Mamdani’s campaign?

Mamdani blends political Islam with Marxist economics — two ideologies that have left tens of millions dead in the 20th century alone.

Perhaps CAIR has a vested interest in Mamdani’s call to “globalize the intifada.” That’s not a call for peaceful protest. Intifada refers to historic uprisings of Muslims against what they call the “Israeli occupation of Palestine.” Suicide bombings and street violence are part of the playbook. So when Mamdani says he wants to “globalize” that, who exactly is the enemy in this global scenario? Because it sure sounds like he's saying America is the new Israel, and anyone who supports Western democracy is the new Zionist.

Mamdani tried to clean up his language by citing the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, which once used “intifada” in an Arabic-language article to describe the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. So now he’s comparing Palestinians to Jewish victims of the Nazis? If that doesn’t twist your stomach into knots, you’re not paying attention.

If you’re “globalizing” an intifada, and positioning Israel — and now America — as the Nazis, that’s not a cry for human rights. That’s a call for chaos and violence.

Rising Islamism

But hey, this is New York. Faculty members at Columbia University — where Mamdani’s own father once worked — signed a letter defending students who supported Hamas after October 7. They also contributed to Mamdani’s mayoral campaign. And his father? He blamed Ronald Reagan and the religious right for inspiring Islamic terrorism, as if the roots of 9/11 grew in Washington, not the caves of Tora Bora.

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

This isn’t about Islam as a faith. We should distinguish between Islam and Islamism. Islam is a religion followed peacefully by millions. Islamism is something entirely different — an ideology that seeks to merge mosque and state, impose Sharia law, and destroy secular liberal democracies from within. Islamism isn’t about prayer and fasting. It’s about power.

Criticizing Islamism is not Islamophobia. It is not an attack on peaceful Muslims. In fact, Muslims are often its first victims.

Islamism is misogynistic, theocratic, violent, and supremacist. It’s hostile to free speech, religious pluralism, gay rights, secularism — even to moderate Muslims. Yet somehow, the progressive left — the same left that claims to fight for feminism, LGBTQ rights, and free expression — finds itself defending candidates like Mamdani. You can’t make this stuff up.

Blending the worst ideologies

And if that weren’t enough, Mamdani also identifies as a Democratic Socialist. He blends political Islam with Marxist economics — two ideologies that have left tens of millions dead in the 20th century alone. But don’t worry, New York. I’m sure this time socialism will totally work. Just like it always didn’t.

If you’re a business owner, a parent, a person who’s saved anything, or just someone who values sanity: Get out. I’m serious. If Mamdani becomes mayor, as seems likely, then New York City will become a case study in what happens when you marry ideological extremism with political power. And it won’t be pretty.

This is about more than one mayoral race. It’s about the future of Western liberalism. It’s about drawing a bright line between faith and fanaticism, between healthy pluralism and authoritarian dogma.

Call out radicalism

We must call out political Islam the same way we call out white nationalism or any other supremacist ideology. When someone chants “globalize the intifada,” that should send a chill down your spine — whether you’re Jewish, Christian, Muslim, atheist, or anything in between.

The left may try to shame you into silence with words like “Islamophobia,” but the record is worn out. The grooves are shallow. The American people see what’s happening. And we’re not buying it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.