STAND with Kelly and Niki Tshibaka

#25: Pam Bondi

• Kelly Tshibaka and Niki Tshibaka

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Buckle up for an engaging session with former Florida Attorney General and member of President Trump's impeachment defense team, Pam Bondi! Pam doesn't hold back, offering her candid reflections on the necessity for truth and transparency in politics, while giving us a preview of her experiences within the legal battles facing the Trump administration.

Our conversation extends into the current political landscape, analyzing the 2022 election results, and strategizing for future conservative successes, all while stressing the critical role of civic engagement in driving America's patriotic resurgence.

Join us in this potent call to action, inviting every listener to play a part in shaping the nation's future. Listen closely, as we lay out the path forward for those ready to stand strong for the principles that make America great.

Support Pam’s efforts at americafirstpolicy.com

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Kelly Tshibaka:

Welcome back to Stand where we help make courage contagious. I'm your host, Kelly Tshibaka, former candidate for US Senate in Alaska and a government watchdog, and I am joined today by my amazing best friend, co-host and husband, Niki Tshibaka, who is a civil rights attorney at the Department of Justice. We are so excited to have you today. I'm also excited to say I get to be the chair of the Trump campaign in Alaska and it is going great. We are so excited to take 2024. We are talking to you today from the land of the midnight sun. We still have snow on the ground here in Anchorage, Alaska. You can be one of our standouts at the Stand Show by going to our website, wwwstandshoworg, where you can find all of our amazing past episodes. Join us on YouTube, hit, subscribe. Make sure to follow. We'd love to have you. We also want to let you know we are bringing Alan Dershowitz live to Alaska June 27th at 7.30 pm. On our website, stanshoworg, you can get one of our tickets. They are going quickly. We have limited seats, so make sure to join us June 27th with Alan Dershowitz.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Who is Alan Dershowitz? Some people have asked me and I say he is the guy who defended Trump at his impeachment trial. Best-selling author. Recently wrote the War Against the Jews and the War on Woke. You want to join us? You want to hear it? Get tickets for Alan Dershowitz. You can see him June 27th. We've got a great interview today with Pam Bondi, the first attorney general female in Florida, one of the defense attorneys who worked with Alan Dershowitz on that Trump impeachment trial. Currently the chair of the Center for Litigation and co-chair of the Center for Law and Justice at America First Policy Institute. All around fantastic human being, going around campaigning for many of our Republican candidates for 2024. You can learn more about Pam and work at AFPI at AmericaFirstPolicycom. Pam, we are so excited and honored to have you with us today.

Pam Bondi:

Thanks Kelly and thanks Niki. I'm so happy to be here. So sorry about the backdrop. I am in Pittsburgh, pennsylvania, and doing an event today for Dave McCormick with Lindsey Graham and Morgan Ortegas, so we're really excited to be here.

Kelly Tshibaka:

We are so excited to have you with us and I hope everything goes so great across Pennsylvania, all of these toss-up states. This is going to be such a huge election year. Niki and I are completely rooting for a big red wave in 2024, but Democrats are following their same old playbook, one you're familiar with it's war by lawfare against President Trump. So they did it in 2020 with this impeachment effort over these allegations that Trump was improperly interfering with investigations into Biden corruption and connection with Ukraine. But it turns out anybody can find this. On the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, they reported that the Bidens have received over $20 million in payments from foreign entities that are not friends of ours, people like China, ukraine, romania. They've concluded that quote Biden is compromised and our national security is threatened. So, pam, you were on that defense team with Alan Dershowitz in that first impeachment trial, helping to secure an acquittal for President Trump. Can you tell us what was your insider take on that trial?

Pam Bondi:

You know, kelly, at the time we knew very little about that much about Hunter Biden and the whole basis for them to try to impeach President Trump was a phone call he made with President Zelensky Now the whole world knows President Zelensky, of course, from Ukraine and it was about Hunter Biden and he thought some things didn't seem right. Hunter Biden was on the board, an oligarch's board, and Joe Biden said that they weren't going to get any money unless they fired a prosecutor who was looking at this oligarch's board. I mean it was crazy stuff. And now, you know, president Trump said it was a perfect phone call. And now look in hindsight, of course it was a perfect phone call. Now we know, even so, much more about what Hunter and the Biden family were doing.

Pam Bondi:

And yes, I got to know Alan Dershowitz. I still talk to Alan all the time and you know, Kelly and Niki, to digress a little bit back then, it's funny how just the world keeps changing. Alan, professor Dershowitz, his big philanthropy, he buys, he gets people to help buy ambulances. You ready for this for Israel? And now, after everything happened on October 7th, I get chills. I call them and I said, wow, look what your ambulances are doing. Now, look what they're doing for our world right now, Alan. So that man does a lot of good and you know, alan's a Democrat, he's a lifelong Democrat, he's a brilliant professor and he sees, he saw in that trial what they did to President Trump and he sees what they're doing now. Sees, he saw in that trial what they did to President Trump and he sees what they're doing now.

Pam Bondi:

And, of course, president Trump was completely vindicated, more so than ever now, because now we know so many. They had buried the details. We couldn't get Niki, we couldn't get half of those documents, we couldn't get a fraction of those documents during this impeachment trial because they were trying to bury him, because they were going after Trump. And now everything that's coming out, we still all talk Jay Sekulow, alan Dershowitz, our whole team, Pat Cipollone, and we're like can you believe this? You know all these documents that they buried and they knew were there, but we couldn't get them because they wanted to remove them from office. That was impeachment round one.

Kelly Tshibaka:

And then we keep going. Yeah right, it just keeps going, and that's what I want to ask you about next. But I want to follow up on what you just said. There have been so many things that have come out, whether it's the Russia collusion, which has ended up being a hoax, and all these things where you know you look back and you go actually Trump was right and they just keep coming after him trying to. You know, I think in psychology don't we call this projection, where you've got an issue and then you just project it on the person you're mad at and the psychiatrist is like actually it's you and yeah, and that's the problem.

Pam Bondi:

It is and it's. I feel like it's just so. It's such a concerted effort and it's so diabolical what they're doing and what they've been able to accomplish. But you know that man is so strong and you know he should have been sitting in front of the US Supreme Court yesterday, yet he was having to sit in a courthouse in New York.

Pam Bondi:

City on something absolutely ridiculous and so it's just, it's nonstop. But yeah, I'm glad you brought up impeachment. I call it impeachment round one because that really he said from day one. It was a perfect phone call. I had the duty to question what was happening and now, knowing what we did, of course he did.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Right, well, and this lawfare is continuing. So now there's this, this imminent trial happening in New York. So they're trying to criminally prosecute him for paying allegedly paying for a nondisclosure agreement with Stormy Daniels, and there's so much, I would just say, questionable conduct around what the prosecutor is doing. Even this Boston University law professor wrote I think the three of us are lawyers, so we would say a pretty compelling analysis in the New York Times, which is not a conservative paper, saying that this is a legal embarrassment for the prosecution, and I was really persuaded by it. I know you were too. What's your take on this trial and how you think it'll turn out?

Pam Bondi:

Yes, so this is a case that the Justice Department years ago, years ago, declined to prosecute.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Involving federal crimes.

Pam Bondi:

So it's southern yeah, the Southern District of New York also declined to prosecute the statute of limitations, which means for non-lawyers. You know how long you have to bring a case has expired years ago, years ago. Bring a case has expired years ago, years ago. So now Alvin Bragg and the New York DA, they come into this case and they basically airdrop in a special prosecutor who is from the Biden administration. You can't make this up.

Pam Bondi:

I mean, it's such a concerted effort to get Donald Trump.

Pam Bondi:

They bring him in and at best and there are no criminal charges here we can talk about that in a minute but they take a misdemeanor and they have to log, tack it on, bootstrap it on to 34 felonies just to make it within the statute of limitations.

Pam Bondi:

So they can bring this case years and years later. There's no reason in the world to bring it other than to keep him off the campaign trail, and they're being successful at that right now. They're not going to be successful ultimately, but they're being successful at that because he's having to sit in that courtroom every single day and you know the prosecution star witness yesterday, a guy named Pecker, who was head of the National Enquirer, said we did nondisclosure agreements all the time. This wasn't Donald Trump, the president. Donald Trump was a celebrity. We did them for Arnold Schwarzenegger. He rattled off names and names of all these celebrities because that's part of business in the business world, when you're a billionaire and people come at you and they're accusing you of things, and so and you know, it's very detailed and, of course, michael Cohen is the star witness against President Trump.

Kelly Tshibaka:

His former lawyer.

Pam Bondi:

His former lawyer, so I don't know how they Attorney. Klein privileges in applying your number one Right.

Pam Bondi:

Right To my fellow friends and attorneys. You know he comes in and says all this salacious stuff that he told him to pay her off. But then Packer, yesterday on the Witness or this last week on the witness stand, last week on the witness stand he comes in and he says he says, listen, donald Trump didn't know that Michael Cohen paid her off. He had no idea when we talked about it and Packer hasn't even talked to Donald Trump since 2019. So their case is falling apart, but they don't care. The goal was to try to embarrass him and to have him sitting in a courtroom, which they got him. You know it's a criminal charge, as we know, it's not a civil case. You can't come and go. He has to be sitting in that courtroom. And then to take it a step further, you know, as attorneys, we know.

Pam Bondi:

You know I prosecuted before. I was attorney general for 18 years and the gag orders used to be on me as a prosecutor. Prosecutors aren't supposed to be talking about the case because you're not supposed to hurt the defendant. All the rights here belong to the accused because he is innocent until proven guilty by a reasonable doubt. Yet they're letting Michael Cohen that witness. He's out there every day trashing Donald Trump on TV, so they put a gag. I've never seen a gag order on a defendant in my entire career. They put a gag order on donald trump saying he can't talk about the court he can't talk about. It's crazy. He can't talk about the main witness who's out there trashing him every single day. You can't make this stuff up and really, as lawyers, it's a shame, because this is what people are seeing. They see this isn't how our justice system typically works. It's not.

Kelly Tshibaka:

It's not supposed to be. And, to your point, you're supposed to be innocent until proven guilty and this defendant has no opportunity to defend his innocence in the court of public opinion, where this is being tried every day, because he is running for president. This is still a campaign. Fortunately, I saw a poll and I think the polls are going to continue to show that, as these trials, this campaign by lawfare, continues, he's going to continue to close the gap in toss-up states and even, I think, pull ahead, because Americans don't want to see this. They don't want to see the abuse of our legal system, our justice system, against political opponents. We don't live in countries where we tolerate that kind of behavior. We're up against a break. Please stand by While you're on break. Go to stanshoworg. Go to any of our social media sites hit subscribe. Make sure to get your tickets to come see Alan Dershowitz, a philanthropist, Trump's impeachment attorney, bestselling author. We're at stanshoworg.

Niki Tshibaka:

So we're back with former Attorney General Pam Bondi. It's so great to have you with us, Pam. Thank you for taking the time.

Niki Tshibaka:

So you've been talking about lawfare and I was thinking about how, oh, let's say back even just eight to 10 years ago, the Democrats used lawfare for their sort of social engineering objectives and goals. Right, they couldn't get it through legislation, so they would go through the courts. I don't think any of us at the time expected that they would actually take it this far to now use lawfare to persecute I'm not even going to say prosecute, persecute political opponents. It is stunning and it is a thing I mean we've heard it over say prosecute, persecute political opponents. It is stunning and it is a thing I mean we've heard it over and over again. But it's true, it's the stuff of a banana republic and they focus on well, this is just about this person. We all know that. It's not just about this person. Once you get started down this road, it's really hard to pull back.

Niki Tshibaka:

So now we were talking about what? The criminal prosecution. Right now that's going on in New York. But at the same day that Trump is sitting in that court, the Supreme Court is deciding another issue, and that issue is the issue of presidential immunity and how far that extends for official acts done by a president while he or she is in office and it's a case that Jack Smith has brought against the president, trying to drum up some kind of charges against him over the whole J6 affair. It's completely ridiculous and it's, I think, really undermining the office of the presidency at great cost and peril to the American people. So I wanted to ask you a little bit about your thoughts on that. How do you think the Supreme Court will will rule on that particular issue?

Pam Bondi:

Yeah, and then Niki, it truly isn't Jack Smith, once again, is trying to rush this as fast as he can because he wants it. You know, I've never, have you ever, seen prosecutors rush a case. You know that's the defense attorneys right To have enough time. And so, once again, Jack Smith's at it again. But, yeah, I think president Trump's attorneys did such a great job and ultimately I think they're going to rule probably late June, July, the Supreme Court. And there are three options. They can say complete immunity, case dismissed. Probably not the most likely thing, given the questions they asked. They could say there's no immunity and say start trial tomorrow. Probably not going to happen. I think most likely what's going to happen is they are going to rule that there is immunity but it's going to be remanded back to the appellate court, back to the trial court, to make the determinations on what acts are immune and what acts are not immune, what acts were in his personal capacity and you know, so under.

Pam Bondi:

There's a case called Nixon v Fitzgerald and that established civil immunity for all presidents and the inference is criminal immunity also applies and I think all the justices' questions were right in line with that. You know, if we don't have criminal immunity for presidents while they're in office, I'm telling you they're just going to become a figurehead. They won't be able to do anything. Every former president will be prosecuted by a political opponent period. The one that should be the most worried about this is Joe Biden.

Pam Bondi:

Seriously, I mean, Harry Truman would have been prosecuted back in the day. You know, if you dropped a bomb the bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima prosecuted. Abe Lincoln probably would have been prosecuted. Every single, every single president would be subject to prosecution. So I and the supreme court asked very thoughtful questions that all the justices did. So that's my best guess. Of course, we don't know how they're going to roll, but that's my best guess. And once it gets if it gets remanded back um to the lower courts, it will take months and months and months of just briefing on all of these issues and then it will be post-election and they won't care anymore.

Niki Tshibaka:

Right, Jack Smith's whole strategy just falls apart in that regard.

Niki Tshibaka:

So yeah that's great, that right there is a victory too, for for President Trump. For President Trump, and speaking of whom you know, a lot of people wonder why is it people on the other side of the aisle, even some Republicans, why are people so loyal to President Trump, why are they so passionate about supporting him? And for those of us who've had some level of personal interaction with him and I mean I haven't had the kind of interaction that you and Kelly have had, but just the short interactions I've had with him Just a wonderful man who loves our country and is sincere and genuine in his passion to make America great and so I'm wondering if you could just talk to our audience a little bit. You've had a lot of interaction with him. You've been with him for a while, supporting him, advocating for him through these various crises. Why do you stick with President Trump? Why have you stuck with him throughout all of this?

Pam Bondi:

Well, I care about him, like I do a family member, I mean I've known him before he was president, before he thought he had run for president.

Pam Bondi:

I adore Melania. I was just at her mom's funeral recently and you know I get to see the real President Trump, not the celebrity. I got to see a husband supporting his wife, his grieving wife, who had just lost her mother. That's the man that I know. He's a great father. His kids are all friends of mine. You know, to tell you, just like a personal story about the man that I know, nicky was one day and it was when the world was about to shut down and he was in the White House and he was still up in the residence because he had been making calls all night long to world leaders. And I never tell personal stories about him, but this one just is so important to me. And his assistant at the time was down in the Oval Office and it was early in the morning, so I called her instead of calling him, because I don't like to call him early in the morning.

Pam Bondi:

And an organization that's like Make-A-Wish it's called Dreams Come True in Florida. They had reached out to me, they tracked me down because they knew how close I was to the president and they said we have this little boy and he's dying of leukemia. And they said all he wants, I get chills. All he wants is to get to talk to the president. We don't know how long he's got, can you help us? And he had leukemia. Jake was like 10 or 12. And of course his head was, you know, bald from the chemo and he had little friends with him and they sent me all these pictures of him. So I sent them to the president's assistant, all these pictures, and I said, listen, this little boy isn't going to make it long. His dad is former military, his mom's a nurse, and when he was in the hospital getting his treatments, he covered, he was covered in the American flag as his blanket, all the nurses gave him. He covered, he was covered in the american flag as his blanket, all the nurses gave him, and he had on his maggot socks and he was just adorable and he just loved the president and that was his. The only wish that they hadn't been able to make.

Pam Bondi:

True come true for this little boy. And they said, listen, he does not have long, it's really bad. So I said, okay, let me see what I can do. So I called the white house and his assistant went up to the residents and said, president, the picture she didn't have, that they were on her computer. She went up and she told the president's story I just told you.

Pam Bondi:

This little boy is about to die. All he wants to do is talk to you. So he calls me, Pam. What's the number? What's the number, what's the number We've got to talk to him. He writes the number down. He writes the number down himself this is our world leader, when everything is going on in the world. And so he says okay, I'll call, let me call him. Hangs up, makes a call, couldn't get through, calls me back, pam, they're not answering. I don't know, I don't know. So I call the little boy's sister. And they weren't answering because they were baptizing him at the time in the family pool because he was about to die. So so they. So I said, president, they were baptizing Jake. So he goes okay, let me try again. So he calls back, he gets them on the phone. And all this was captured, the phone call, on video, because they had a videographer there baptizing Jake. So that's how I know the details of the phone call and I'll never reveal that.

Pam Bondi:

It'll never be public, but it was one of the most beautiful phone calls I've ever heard between a man and a dying little boy who looked up to this man and it was like a father figure talking to this little boy and talking to his parents and it was just so beautiful and so kind. And so call ended and the president called me back and said thank you, I got to talk to him. Let me know next week how's he doing. Let me know how he's doing. Okay, I want to send him some stuff. So then the president hang up, he comes down, he's in the Oval Office and I call it a swab room. They have a room outside the Oval Office. All this stuff like stuffed animals and all presidents have it like really cool stuff for kids who come to visit and people. And so his assistant told me he said get me a box. And he went in there with a big box this is the president, this is the man that I love with a big box and started filling it with stuffed animals and stuff swag. And he saw the picture up on his assistant's screen of the little boy with a bald head in a golf cart with another child with a bald head, you know, because they were going through chemo. He saw it and he said print that picture. And she printed it and he wrote on there.

Pam Bondi:

I still have that picture of. I still have a copy of that picture. Dear Jake, please look over all of us in heaven, love Donald Trump. He framed it, he packed up the box. They overnighted it to the family, but I had a screenshot of the picture, so I got to call the family. I sent the family the screenshot of the picture, so Jake saw the picture and then they overnighted all the things and then the next day they call back Pam, did Jake get everything? And I said no, sir, he died early this morning, but he got to see the picture that you signed for him. And now the family, they have all of that and they asked if they could go public with the video and I said no.

Pam Bondi:

And they agreed it was a private time between a man and a little boy. So that's the man that I know, and people could tell you a hundred stories like that of things that he does for kids and families, and that's why the people that truly know him Kelly knows him, people that know him, you know, you love him. He's a good man. What?

Niki Tshibaka:

you see on.

Pam Bondi:

TV is the showman, which is hilarious.

Niki Tshibaka:

Yeah, it is Appreciate that, Pam. Thanks for sharing that Wow powerful story. Yeah.

Kelly Tshibaka:

It definitely brought tears to my eyes. We're coming up on a break. I'll talk with you, Niki, after the break about my personal first encounter with President Trump. But I agree with you that after you know somebody, when they get vilified and maligned in the media, then you're like, nah, not true. I know false fake news, I know that person. And then when you run for US Senate and get vilified and maligned in the media with things that they've just made, completely made up, and you're like, well, that's how that works then. And then everyone just goes around parroting the lies. You're like, well, that's how that works then. And then everyone just goes around parroting the lies. You're like, that's exactly how it's a slander campaign and it just catches fire like the Salem witch trials, and so everyone in their fear fest goes around spreading the lies and fears and fear mongering.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I don't think anybody is perfect and I'm not hiring a priest, people who also aren't perfect to be the leader of the nation. I don't think any leader has held themselves out to be perfect. But this man is not who the left media portrays him to be and, as we've talked about all these trials by lawfare, they definitely have gone down. They've projected a bit and have gone down roads that, in retrospect, have proven Trump to be right. So I am hoping and believing that throughout the year he'll be vindicated by many of these trials, that they'll boomerang back and all go well. Actually, he was right and I think a lot of America is waking up to see that that actually is the case that this weaponization of the legal system might indeed be the greatest threat to our democracy and our republic and a government led by the people. When a weaponized legal system, a weaponized court system, when the party in charge can use their law enforcement, their courts, their military, to come down on the civilians of the United States of America, that might be the greatest threat that we're facing, and so I appreciate you being with us today, pam. Thank you so much. This has been another fantastic interview on Stand. We're going to pick up just on the other side of this break. You can get all our episodes at standshoworg Hit, subscribe, get your tickets for Alan Dershowitz coming live to Alaska June 27th. We'll be right back after this break. Welcome back to Stand with Kelly and Niki Tshibaka.

Kelly Tshibaka:

We just finished up our interview with Pam Bondi, who has worked in many respects with President Trump and currently is going around campaigning for candidates who are running for US Senate in the United States. And I was just so touched, Niki, Niki, by the conversation she shared with us that she had with president Trump for this young boy who was passing away in Florida. When you asked her why does she stick with president Trump, with all the allegations and the negative media and the things that are said, why does she stick with him? And it reminds me when people ask me about what President Trump's like and my first interaction with him. So I've seen the news and I'd seen him at his rallies kind of the rally persona, if you will.

Kelly Tshibaka:

And you and I, I think, watched every episode of the Apprentice back when he was a I don't know, it's not a talk show host, but a media personality, if you will. You're fired, right, we love that. And do you remember when I went in and got my, I had to go ask for the endorsement for the US Senate campaign and so I had to do all this prep work and I wasn't sure which President Trump I was going to get. Is it the you're fired President Trump? The boardroom President.

Niki Tshibaka:

Trump Right? Or is it the rally President Trump I was going to get? Is it the? You're fired, president Trump? The boardroom President.

Pam Bondi:

Trump.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Right, or is it the rally, president Trump?

Niki Tshibaka:

Right.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Or is it the MSNBC version of President Trump? I don't know. And fortunately, having had the experience I'd had in federal government, briefing cabinet members all the time and then in executive boardrooms at the time I had just finished being one of the cabinet members for governor of Alaska I was really familiar with giving briefs to senior government officials, so going in and briefing him was not a particularly intimidating experience. I thought that was fine. I've been with a lot of bright people so I felt prepared. I just didn't know really what to expect. So this was at the top of Trump Tower and my team that had been briefing me. They were very nervous. For me I mean just sweating and jittery. I think they were nervous I was going to bomb. I think they were nervous that I was so calm.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I walked in and I was first struck by how grandfatherly he was and so, just like what Pam was talking about, this doesn't ever come across in his kind of TV persona or even in the YouTube videos, whatever you watch, of him being presidential, being presidential, in his personal mannerisms he's actually very paternal, very tender, very kind, very gentle. The other thing that struck me is, having been in many executive boardrooms, oftentimes the only woman in the room. At no time did I ever feel demeaned. I was with him for about an hour, never felt demeaned, condescended to, objectified in any way, which was shocking, because that happens to me regularly and at this point it's just sort of like, you know, being a woman in an executive world. But at no point did I ever feel like this person who is so much more accomplished, so much more financially empowered, so much more powerful I mean, imagine the experiences he's had as president he didn't feel patronized at all.

Kelly Tshibaka:

No, absolutely not. And in fact, there were many ways and words that he used to equalize me and I thought, no, that's actually, that's factually inaccurate. I am not your peer in any way. I mean, he has decades of more experience than me in so many ways, but he went out of his way to honor me, which I thought was interesting, not what I expected, not because of what people have said about him, but just based on my previous experiences, like everywhere, right. So, and then, finally, I was just absolutely astounded by how incredibly intelligent he is, having been with really intelligent people, like a couple really intelligent people.

Niki Tshibaka:

Oh, you're married to one.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I mean, I'm married married to one for sure. In all humility you say that right. And having gone to school with some some really intelligent people and then knowing really bright people, he is one of the most intelligent people I've ever met. So he would ask a question and then a normal response. I'm unlike how I'm talking now. By the way, I'll just acknowledge I've talked for a little bit here.

Kelly Tshibaka:

A normal response time for someone on a question is about 90 seconds, sometimes two minutes, like if you leave a voicemail. It's about 60 seconds is about how often somebody talks on a quick voicemail and he would process what I was saying and cut me off at a 30 to 45 seconds, and then he would switch the subject to something totally different. He would process what I was saying and cut me off at a 30 to 45 seconds and then he would switch the subject to something totally different. So how are you going to win this race? And I would start to tell him my strategy. What are your polls? I'd start to tell him my strategy. Who supports you? I'd start to tell him my strategy. How are you going to win the world vote?

Kelly Tshibaka:

I'd start to tell him, and he would just pepper me with questions, and it wasn't that he was interrupting and being rude, he was just that far ahead of me. And then he would fact check me and so I would tell him okay, here are my polling numbers. Okay, hold on, let me check. And he'd call his pollster right there. So I knew apprentice style, having watched the show. If I were wrong, it would have been you're fired, right, and I would have been shown the door. It would have been you don't get the endorsement. Who supports you? I told him so. Then he would just like Pam said, he would just call a random Alaskan. He'd say to his secretary yell at the door, get me so-and-so's number. She'd say so-and-so's on the line and getting a cold call from the president to say hey, what do you think about Kelly Tshibaka? And then this went on for like an hour.

Niki Tshibaka:

But what I love about that story too I mean, you're talking about his how paternal he was, how professional he was, how kind he was, how sounds like even humble he was in terms of his interactions with you. What I also appreciate about it is how insightful his questions were to you and how prepared he was.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Yeah, with no notes.

Niki Tshibaka:

Because he's lived for decades as an executive, as a CEO, he knows how to grasp a bunch of information, digest it, get to the core pieces, the valuable pieces of it that he needs to make, whatever decision he needs to make. And just in terms of how you've talked about his interactions in his interview with you for the endorsement, how well prepared he was, how you're saying he was even a step ahead of you, that makes me think about hmm, I wonder if that's what he's also like in the Oval Office when he's making decisions.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Yeah, good point.

Niki Tshibaka:

And that gives me a lot of peace of mind compared to what we currently have in the Oval Office. So that's a really cool story. I mean, I really enjoyed the couple of times that I got to interact with him when I was with you and just also struck by just how approachable and down to earth he was, and that's why people love him.

Pam Bondi:

Right.

Niki Tshibaka:

He's not an elitist. And that resonates with the rest of America.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Yeah, super gracious, and I really appreciate and respect how Pam is spending her time helping these people campaign. I would love to see us have a red wave in 2024, which is what so many of us were expecting in 2022. And instead, in some parts of the country expecting in 2022. And instead, in some parts of the country, we got a red trickle. And now, with what's happening in the House, I think it's hard to even say we got that, and so I think one of the questions that I want to chat with you about and we might have to carry this over the break is how do we guarantee, how do we get maybe guarantee is a strong word a red wave? How do we get a red wave in 2024?

Kelly Tshibaka:

One of the things I'm realizing we're up against a really big mayor race here in Anchorage, right around the corner, and one of the things I've noticed I'm just going to be super direct about it, because I know you can take it, because we're married and I'm hoping our audience can, because if you're watching a show called Stand, then you can weather a storm. I just want to just say maybe it's not Democrats winning races or the left winning races, maybe it's Republicans losing them. Can we just be blunt about it? When we don't show up to volunteer, when we won't hit the ground in the pavement for candidates like Pam's doing, when we won't open our pocket books and put our money where our complaining mouths are, then that's how we lose races across the country.

Niki Tshibaka:

Or we won't vote and when you won't, freaking, get out to vote.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Just do the basic work of speaking your voice through a vote, instead of speaking it at the bar, on social media and at the water cooler, then that's how you lose races. If you want to stop a losing streak, then do something.

Niki Tshibaka:

Yeah, and you know we talk a lot about and we'll we'll talk more about this after the break but we talk a lot about the red wave. Right, we want a red wave. I just, I, I think a lot of people right now I know I'm at this place at least, and just conversations I've had with people, things I'm reading the wave that they want is just a, let say, a spangled wave, right, a return to what we're really supposed to be about, because this administration has led us so far astray, so far astray of who we are as a country. I mean it's shocking what they have done to tear down our institutions, our values, our educational system. I mean it's horrifying. And so this is an opportunity coming up in this election for us to vote for people and leaders who are going to pull us back from what I would say the precipice of the abyss, because if we don't, we are going to not recognize our country and we're going to be passing down to our children is a country that is not the America that we knew.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I think that's a good point. What I would tell you. It's a great point it's. A great point Is that spangled wave right now I love that picture is encompassed by values that are red. So it would be a free market economy. It would be secure borders. It would be resource, resource development, so we're not dependent on foreign adversaries for energy. It'd be our traditional values.

Niki Tshibaka:

Those are the kinds of things that we are fighting for but I would say here's a little bit of nicky and kelly back and forth, but I would say that there are a lot of americans who are not traditional Republicans.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I think that's fair. Who are?

Niki Tshibaka:

part of that spangled way.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Who now agree with that? Yeah, which means our party is getting bigger. We're up on a break and join us on the other side. Stanshoworg, hit, subscribe, grab your Alan Dershowitz tickets. We'll see you in a minute. Stand by.

Niki Tshibaka:

Welcome back. You are watching or listening to Stand with Kelly and Niki Tshibaka and we were just talking about how are we going to see or get a red wave, what I call a spangled wave, this coming election cycle cycle. When I say spangled, I'm thinking about all of the people who haven't necessarily called themselves Republicans but are aligning themselves with the Republican Party now that Trump has created, that's really expanded its tent pegs. We are bringing in people, independents and even Democrats who before never would have imagined themselves part of this Make America Great Again movement. So one of the things I was thinking about, Kelly, in terms of how do we see this wave happen, is, in some ways, I think Biden and his folks I'll call them folks are creating that and generating that wave for us.

Niki Tshibaka:

I am as frustrated as any other supporter of Trump seeing him basically being gagged by a judge when he has a First Amendment right to speak. It just goes to how they are continually trying to change the rules of the game, so to speak, to keep him silenced and to defeat him in this election. Those kinds of things are actually galvanizing the masses. It's exciting us to push back and say that is not the America we want. That is not the America we believe in, that is not the America we pay our taxes to support, that is not the America that our soldiers go out and bleed and die for. That is not the America that our founders established, that is not the America we want to pass down to our children.

Niki Tshibaka:

And so, the more that they do this, the more they are inspiring and emboldening Americans across the country, including Americans who traditionally were on opposite sides of, if not the political aisle, the social values aisle, whatever you want to call it to come and coalesce behind the president, because we want to make a statement to those elitists, to those people who think that they can puppeteer the strings of government and control our lives and intimidate us into silence, that no, we will not be silent. We know what our rights are, we know the America that our soldiers have died for and that's the America we want to pass down to our children. Persecuting political opponents and using a system of justice in a way that is so corrupt, it just boggles the mind our ability to speak with authority to other nations about justice, about freedom, about rights. Because of what we're doing right now, we've totally undermined, I think, our standing and what we've done before the American people and before the world.

Kelly Tshibaka:

And our founders warned about this. So remember, in the beginning they said it's incumbent on us to create this form of government because the ruling party, the ruling class in England, has committed these abuses against the people, and government can only lead by the consent of those governed and therefore we have an obligation to do something. And then they also said now that we've created this government, it's up to us to then have the obligation to manage and lead it here. And I think it is because of apathy, complacency, maybe being too busy, that we have become a little bit complicit in what's happening, and I think we have to take ownership of that. When we have the lowest voter turnout in history, when elections are being decided by 18, 20% of a population.

Niki Tshibaka:

You're talking about in Alaska lowest voter turnout.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Yeah, in Alaska, but we weren't the only state. There were other jurisdictions that while some places had really high voter turnout in our last election cycle, 2022, other states had toss-up, states had really low turnout. And then you talk about local races which, by the way, are the building ground, the building blocks and the breeding ground for politicians and leaders to then move up to a state. In national politics, decisions are being made by a fifth of the population and our founders would say that's the problem.

Kelly Tshibaka:

In fact, one of the people who wrote an extremely compelling book which these two political science nerds have read, but I think most of our population hasn't he said the greatest risk to this new American system of government, which has never been created before, nothing like this has ever been created and I don't think anything could ever be created since. He said the greatest risk is not from the outside. He said you will have a lot of political enemies. You will have your battles and wars, which we've done pretty well in guys. He said the greatest threat to America will be from the inside. It'll be from Americans who will not responsibly handle what has been given to them and, through taxation, through not managing the government that they have. They will get drunk on power or drunk on complacency and they will let the whole thing fall apart.

Niki Tshibaka:

You're talking about the Tocqueville.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Yes, yes.

Niki Tshibaka:

That was a great paraphrase.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Yeah, nice pop quiz there, taking you all the way back to college.

Niki Tshibaka:

Yeah, and that's so important because, you know, the point that he makes is the beauty of the American experiment, but also the fragility of it. Right, and we have, I think, lost an appreciation for how fragile freedom is. But we're seeing it right now. Right, we saw it with COVID, but we're seeing it right now. We saw it with COVID. We're seeing it with what the Biden administration has done in so many ways, not just within our educational system, us.

Niki Tshibaka:

And so what do we do? We stand. How do we stand? We use our voices, we get up, we go out there, we advocate for the America that, the traditional values that we believe in, that have made America the greatest civilization, the greatest nation ever in history. And we vote, we vote. Whether our votes are counted, whether there's chicanery that happens, that's on whoever does it, but we, I think, always have to take ownership of our responsibility and say, whatever the outcome, it's not going to be because we failed to engage in our civic responsibilities to advocate for what we believe America should be and is about.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I think another thing we can do is get involved. So a lot of times what I'll hear is well, that's uncomfortable and that's awkward. Yes, that's correct. I just want to validate that. And, as you've heard me say to our kids many times, life is a series of awkward moments separated by snacks.

Niki Tshibaka:

Well, for you it is.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I excel in the awkward.

Niki Tshibaka:

Yes, you do.

Kelly Tshibaka:

I've made it one of my sub-expertises. I should add that to my LinkedIn profile.

Niki Tshibaka:

Keep us all entertained.

Kelly Tshibaka:

Yes, but if we just acknowledge that something's going to go awkward today, then everything just gets a lot easier. So now door knocking, for example, or cold calling people, becomes a lot easier when you realize it's just as awkward for me as it feels for you. So if you just jump in to the swimming pool of awkward, this whole thing warms up, if you just get in and start swimming. So call that person who you want to be supporting, or the candidate, the campaign that you want to win, and say how can I help? There's all kinds of ways to help, even being a keyboard warrior and getting the word out on social media, not to your 92 followers, but to posting in social media groups in places where people are actually there and listening. That can influence things.

Kelly Tshibaka:

But making calls, phone banking, door knocking, stretching yourself and giving some dollars, even $5, will really help. These are the kind of things that actually make elections get across the finish line and win if we want to take a stand. And then there are other issues and causes to get involved in that help push the nation forward as well. But 2024 is going to be a really critical race and again I don't think that the left is winning because they win, as my mom would tell me growing up. Playing sports, honey, you didn't win, you didn't lose that, or they didn't win that game, you lost that game. You didn't win, you didn't lose that, or they didn't win that game, you lost that game. And you can decide how you play, and it's not always that well you know, they just outplayed us.

Kelly Tshibaka:

That's not how it goes. We have a choice in how this goes.

Niki Tshibaka:

Yeah, and so I'm really optimistic. I'm optimistic for 2024. And I mean, I don't know if you're feeling it, but I'm feeling it as I'm watching the news and reading articles.

Kelly Tshibaka:

People are coming together in a new way. There's a coalescing.

Niki Tshibaka:

There's something that's happening that I think can be, and will be, very positive, going forward as we come together as a nation and agree. We may have our differences, but we all agree that what we're seeing right now, that's not us.

Kelly Tshibaka:

And that's not who we're going to be Right, we want leaders who are agreed on what America is and what it means, for example, is that we have a border.

Niki Tshibaka:

Yeah Right, just the basics, just the basics.

Kelly Tshibaka:

And it means that we're not getting taxed at such an absurd percentage that we can't feed our families.

Niki Tshibaka:

Like super basics, like that it means that, as parents like we, actually have the right to parent our children and not have the educational system have secret conversations with them about, you know.

Kelly Tshibaka:

We didn't delegate out, we didn't surrender our parental rights without anybody telling us exactly. So this is stand with Kelly and Niki Tshibaka. You can find us at stand showorg, we're so glad that you joined us today. Make sure to get your tickets for Alan Dershowitz. If you are in Alaska, live in Alaska. If you're not in Alaska, what a great time to come to Alaska this June. Make sure that you align it with the trip for Alan Dershowitz on June 27. Standshoworg, hit, subscribe, follow us. We will see you next week. We're so glad to have you as one of our standouts. Stands firm and stands strong.

People on this episode

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Kelly Tshibaka

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Niki Tshibaka

Host