in the state of Ohio.

Megan, and there are an awful lot of Democrats in the state of Ohio who are capable of being governor.

They didn't nominate one of those people for their party.

They nominated the woman who was in charge in, in Ohio during COVID, and you mentioned this a few times, but the number of businesses she shut down is often glossed over.

I mean, when you shut down businesses, you shut down people's livelihoods.

Of course, they're upset, and if she wants to say she's a doctor, then to these businesses, she's Dr. Kevorkian because what she did to these people in the state of Ohio is unforgivable.

They haven't forgotten it, and she is afraid of her own record.

J- Johnny, you wanna kick this one off and we'll go from there.

How are you feeling about that effort?

Well, they certainly seem to think so.

You know, there's been an awful lot of conversation about the turnout of these low propensity Trump voters in 2018 and 2022.

And how's it going to work in 2026? And if you talk to Blair, you talk to LaCivita, they think they have that magic sauce to get them out.

And a lot of it goes to the president and, you know, all the things the president has delivered and what they've learned by talking to these people.

consistently over the years and never stopping their their communications with them to understand what it is that's motivating them to turn out and vote.

And, you know, listen, Kurt, this is it's one of the most important aspects of this upcoming midterm election, making sure that they they they turn out.

I'm thinking that maybe we're missing a lot of Trump voters because every pinko commie and leftist weirdo out there is just aching to tell the pollster how politically correct they are.

How could you turn that campaign around?

Well, first of all, I'm not sure we would – There's political consultants and then there are mercenaries, as you say, and I'm not sure we would have we would have taken that job for El-Sayed.

And I'm not really sure what he can do to dig out from the hole that he's created for himself.

All of the associations with Hassan Pike are all of the controversial things.

He has said about 9-11 for crying out loud.

And here he stands against Mike Rogers, a professional from the American security business and a guy who's dedicated his career to keeping our country safe.

On the 25th anniversary of 9-11, this race for Senate in Michigan really is high noon in a way that a lot of the other Senate races aren't.

Does Paxton just go negative every day or does he try and repair his image?

Overall, how do you feel about the Republicans' chances for holding the Senate in the midterms?

Well, Republicans aren't without opportunity, um, in these Senate races.

You look at the, the seats that are most hotly contested, places like Ohio, Iowa, Alaska this year, Texas, those are states where Republicans should be able to win.

The question is, can we win? And I've worked on Republican Senate races for almost 20 years now.

And, um, we do have a lot going for us, but I think it's pretty easy to say, uh, we got a lot going against us too.

Um, one of the big concerns the Republicans have in midterms during the Trump era is will the Trump voters turn out for, uh, elections when he's, his name is not on the ballot? Now, if you look through recent history, the 2018 midterm, the 2022 midterm, each of those successive midterms, they, the Trump voters have turned out at a little bit of a higher rate.

And there's reason to believe they can do, uh, even more now in 2026.

How about, uh, El-Sayed versus Rogers? We, uh, I thought, uh, the, I thought the, uh, Democrats' appearance on Jesse Watters was a, just an absolute disaster for him.

Are they going to give us this guy as a gift so Mike Rogers can win?

You know, I think this guy is going to win.

If you look at any of the polls right now, it looks like he is running away with it in their primary against Haley Stevens.

And that's not necessarily a bad thing for Republicans.

But Michigan has been a difficult state for us to win a federal race in over the last 20 years or so.

You might remember a guy named Spence Abraham was a senator back in the day, last Republican.

to be a senator that represents that state.

Is it possible to overplay that hand or is just a steady diet of insanity from the Francesca Hong's, the Abdul Al-Sayed's and the Zoran Mamdami's? Is that just as good a content as any we can come up with? Doesn't hurt.

We played the sound bites yesterday.

Okay.

Yeah, so, so she is studious about maintaining this image as a potential bridge builder for her party, recognizing the fact that her party is as divided as hell.

You've got the radical communists on one side, and then you have the old school Democrats who are trying to get elected on the other side, and she is presenting herself as a potential bridge to pull those two sides together.

You can see her working to try to make this happen.

There's only one way of filling it, and it actually does take the toiling work of building a family, being faithful, making your meals together, going to church on Sundays, all the stuff that your average American does in order to find happiness.

Yeah, Whitlock is, his observations are always astute, and he, he has a way of conveying stuff in a very simple manner that I think everybody sort of digests and appreciates.

I mean, I, I won't pretend to know what's going through Brady's mind, but I do know that if I went home every night and just scrolled TikTok and then woke up the next morning, I'd be like, "Well, where the hell did my night go?" Because that wasn't-

My first question is, would you rather be the owner of 42nd Street between 2nd and 3rd, the former Pfizer high-rise that's collapsing, or be the campaign manager for Graham Platner?

Oh, man.

Hugh, that's a really tough call, I've got to be honest with you.

But I thought, you know, on the main Senate race situation, I thought that you had one of the greatest takes on that race and the media coverage of it this morning when you described that New York Times story from a few weeks ago, not as a catch and kill, but a trap and tame, Hugh.

Oh, thank you.

That is a very astute way of describing what The New York Times appeared to be trying to achieve with that story that everybody was talking about ahead of time behind the scenes.

And then it comes out and all of a sudden this girl, Lindsay, who was put through the ringer by Democrats, nobody believed her.

Are they allowed to pay him off? Can they just go to him and say, we'll give you a million dollars to get out of the race? Because he doesn't have a job, he doesn't have money.

Well, John Adams got it right

and we all get it wrong.

And I'm John Ashbrook and I've got the final word on the Fox News Rundown.

John Ashbrook.

What's on your mind? A lot has changed in the last 250 years.

The earliest days of our great nation were difficult for every man, woman, and child brave enough to settle in a new land.

Everyday life was often violent on the frontier.

Disease was rampant and families faced long odds simply maintaining shelter or putting food on the table.

Explain this one

... yeah, he said he was a har- harbormaster, and then they, they called the guys working at the harbor, and they're like, "Uh, nah, not exactly.

He's, uh, uh...

We really don't have anybody like, uh, that des- fits the description of that job, uh, that he claims to hold." But this guy's, is an absolute lunatic.

Of course, the Nazi tattoo isn't just a Nazi tattoo, it's a Totenkopf.

This is, this is the insignia worn by the guards at the concentration camps.

It's the worst of the worst you could possibly imagine.

Unbelievable.

Guys, weigh in.

Yeah, he's won statewideYeah, Brian, he's won statewide there many times.

This is a guy who can win, especially the more people learn about James Talarico.

You know, there's a lot of, uh, speculation about how much this race is going to cost.

It is going to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

You can be sure the Democrats are gonna invest almost everything they have in that state.

But at the end of the day, it's a red state, it's voted for the president many, many times, and I think it's gonna go red this fall.

Anybody else belong on that list, and how do you feel about the tightness between Rubio and Vance?

Lot they're willing to overlook.

Well, that was, that was gonna be my point, is that, like, if he was just an invented entity to just see how, what Democrats could ultimately gravitate towards, like, what kind of a hollow shell of a human you could get them to actually rally around and say that they want to be a Senate candidate, like, I don't know what you'd change.

I mean, th- this is everything from Nazism and tattoos to misogyny and, and, you know, sexual reference.

Now masturbating in Porta Potties.

I mean, what else? [laughs] We...

There's not a lot of boxes left to check here.

He also said Maine sucks.

[laughs]

We are about to have big primaries, and how do you see things shaping up right now as this midterm gets underway?

No, you're right, Dana, there are six months to go, but there are some factors that have already been set.

For example, on election day in 2024 when Donald Trump won, all of a sudden the Republican House majority was in jeopardy just because of history.

If you look back through history, the party out of power usually does very well in a midterm.

So there's a really good wind for Democrats that they're trying to take advantage of right now.

And then there are a couple of months between now and June, and June is really the, the time period in elections where public perception about the economy is largely set.

And, you know, there are a lot of macroeconomic factors that do very well for Republicans right now.

Mm-hmm.

Ugh

... how great the media is doing these investigations.

One thing that we know about the mainstream media is that they only attack a Democrat if it's in service of a second Democrat.

You just had a great conversation with Steve Hilton.

I hope to God that that guy can get over the finish line in California, because what good would it do for the state? My...

But my point is, the media, while they're patting themselves on the back about how well they're doing on Swalwell, all of a sudden, you know, they have no interest...

You know that video, for example.

I'm not sure exactly the sex act.

[laughs]

-Ben Rhodes to Metternich.

But here's the, here's the thing, Hugh.

This guy and his ilk spent their entire careers in Washington appeasing the Iranian regime that has instigated so much terrorism across the world and has tried to destroy our country for forty-seven years.

And, you know, they used our own tax dollars.

Everybody f- remembers the famous air dropping of American cash that was put into that airplane by American taxpayers.

We've got April fifteenth coming up.

He was the Iran guy in Trump One.

Wow.

Yeah.

Depends on how much hair I have.

Thank you, Ashbrook.

And it's, it's got three...

He's got three snaps in there.

What is the feeling inside the Ruthless studio?

Well, you know, we're all waiting to hear what comes out of this Senate briefing that occ- uh, may be occurring right now as we speak.

You know, T-Trump, top administration officials letting everybody in the Senate know what the stakes are on the ground, what, what the, what accomplishments have been made on the ground, and it sure seems like those accomplishments are many.

It, it, it seems, if w- if, if the reports are to be believed, that the missile capabilities of Iran have been significantly degraded in the last 72 hours, that their navy is maybe completely gone.

And, you know, I heard General Jack Keane just a little bit ago talking about how the Iranian Navy was trying to set mines in the Strait of Hormuz.

If our Navy has taken them out and prevented them from doing something like that, it is quite an accomplishment.

And, you know, they are, they are moving from this missile strategy to a little bit more of a drone strategy, which you've probably been following.

Uh, could not a reconciliation, because it's a spending bill, move fairly quickly to plus up the Defense Department budget to make good what we've expended and to accelerate what we need, which is Golden Dome?

What do you think that message is being sent?

Well, obviously, he knows the state of Texas much, much better than I do.

But I'll tell you, Hugh, every single one of these special elections and the governor's elections in, uh, in New Jersey, in Virginia, in 2025, should serve as a wake-up call to Republicans that these midterms are for real, that every candidate has to run their ass off if they want to be able to get across the finish line next November, and if they don't have a good campaign that's based on the fundamentals that it takes to win.

It's not like who can tweet the best, although that's part of it.

It's not who, who raises the most money, although that's part of it.

It's who has an organization that is built to win in a difficult environment, and there is no way around the fact that Republicans are in a difficult environment this fall.

I mean, it's, it's histo- historically difficult for any party in power, and Republicans do not have Trump on the ballot in 2026.

Yep

Yeah.

And, I mean, it is, it is a great place to grow up, great place to raise a family.

They've got some big companies in town, and so I have friends who m- have moved in in, like, middle age to take jobs in the city, and they're like, "Man, everybody seems to already know-"

Mm

... kind of in its heyday, and Republicans wanted to make sure that they had relationships with these talk radio shows.

And so I knew a lot of the producers, and, and, um, you know, a- a- and I, I loved conservative talk radio.

Always loved it-

We have seen what's happening in Minnesota, where Democrats have realized there's a lot of money to be made, and voters, votes to be had, if we just find these certain groups of people to pay off and let them run amok, and that's what the Democrat Party has become, essentially, is they're happy to import voters that they can pay for, who are reliable, as opposed to having to deal with losing to Donald Trump, not only in the Electoral College, but the popular vote.

Yeah, what Smug is saying is exactly right, and, uh, we actually interviewed Tom Homan last week on the Ruthless podcast, and we asked him this exact question: "You know, you've been in law enforcement, border enforcement, for an entire career.

You were given a medal by Barack Obama because you were doing such a good job.

At what point did you notice this shift between Democrats who were ostensibly for law and order to now, where they are backing this foreign-funded insurgency in Minnesota?" And he said that he identified what Smug was talking about, and also said that when Trump came into office, Democrats were just like, "We're gonna oppose absolutely everything Trump does, no matter what it means for this country, because we think that's good politics for us." Obviously, they learned in 2024 it wasn't such good politics for them.

But their party has gone off an absolute cliff.

I mean, under what circumstances would you align with foreign billionaires who are pumping money into ruining this country? I think that the future for their party is, is very, very dicey.

Um, and we'll see what happens in this midterm, but, I mean, beyond that, Americans want a safe country.

Yep.

It has been an obstacle.

And I'm John Ashbrook, and I've got the final word on the Fox News Rundown.

[upbeat music]

What's on your mind?

"Greenland, oh, Greenland, how much do you cost? We're bringing the checkbook of our deal-making boss." Those are the words Henry Wadsworth Longfellow might have written had his eyes seen today's news.

But on a more serious note, President Trump seems determined to bring Greenland into the American fold.

And here's what you may not know: the island is as close to New York City as Honolulu is to Los Angeles, and it wouldn't be our first land purchase of a nearby island.

A Democrat president bought the Virgin Islands from Denmark in 1917, and if a Democrat can buy an island to protect us from the Germans, then a Republican should be allowed to buy an island to protect us from today's threats, and that's what President Trump asserts this Greenland deal will provide: security for America's hemisphere, security for America's supply chains, security for America's resource needs.

The guy who doesn't produce this show? (laughs)

They, uh... (laughs) Well, they flew, they flew these jets so low over Caracas that the sound was deafening and nobody could hear the helicopters coming in from underneath.

I mean, it was one of the most brilliant things that most other people would never even think of but they thought of every last detail right down to that.

And you gotta think that the Chinese, you gotta think that the Russians, you gotta think the Iranians look at a mission like that and the way the US, the US was able to pull that off and they're like, "Well, we could never do anything like that." And what a contrast between the way that Joe Biden handled himself with Afghanistan and everything else and the way that President Trump is handling things, letting the military work.

You got a lot of really smart people, they know what to do, you let them go out and you let them win.

Have you noticed that they've lost their mind over the fact that we have once again done s- done something that Joe Biden and Barack Obama never dared do, much less accomplish? I-- they really have lost their mind that this was done.

They have and it, it doesn't make any sense to me.

I mean, why can't they just say, "Yeah, we all said Maduro needed to go and now he's gone." Why can't they just say, "Oh, that's great." And move on to something else.

Like, this is, this seems like it's sort of par for the course.

Yeah, and I also think that this is the most transparent administration that we have ever had in our lifetimes, and they're not afraid of saying what it is they're doing, what it is they're thinking, because they're making such great progress.

And I think that came through in the story.

And there was a piece of news that they didn't push out on Twitter that caught my attention.

It's when she was talking about his building of this great, uh, room off of the East Wing, and she said that that's not where it stops.

And, and so much of the left is just losing their minds-

Mm-hmm.

She's a chief of staff.

I'm going to, you know, have all these side effects from estrogen," and so they abruptly stopped it.

And I'm John Ashbrook, and I've got the final word on the Fox News Rundown.

(news music plays)

Listen and follow now at foxnewspodcast.com.

This is John Ashbrook with your Fox News commentary coming right up.

Mari pulls this out?

I think he's got a really good shot of pulling it out, Hugh.

And I've seen so many different numbers that people have thrown out.

And, you know, there's a, there's an expectation that he will get some of the Spanberger crossover vote, and there's an expectation that he will benefit from some undervote from Democrats who don't like what Jay Jones said but aren't gonna pull the lever for Republicans.

The reason why Democrats worked so hard through this shutdown to build up partisanship is so that they could convince regular old Democrats to overlook everything that Jay Jones said and only think in partisan terms and not in terms of who's the best person to serve in this job.

Jason Miyares is an incredible AG.

He's very serious about safety.

... followed by property taxes?

And Zohran Mamdani is all arms with him, buddy-buddy, arms around each other, laughing, just a couple weeks ago calling him a pillar of the community.

Another thing.

So I saw a statistic where, uh, following the events of September 11th across the United States and in New York City they did polling.

The approval rating for Muslim Americans has gone up significantly among conservatives, among liberals, across America, and in New York City.

And all a result of that is you have these left wing candidates running on how everyone's mean to Muslims, everyone's mean to Muslims, everyone's mean to Muslims.

We welcome these people into our country with the promise that this is the land of opportunity.

Join this nation, be a member of this society, and you can succeed.

Period.