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EXCLUSIVE: Nick Shirley fires back at Minnesota critics: 'Numbers don't lie, and convictions don't lie'
Nick Shirley never planned to become one of the nation's best known independent journalists, making videos that would dominate the national conversation and be retweeted by vice presidents and CEOs.
Yet in the wake of his Minnesota fraud investigation, Shirley has exploded onto the national scene as a one-man journalism machine.
Recently, he sat down with Fox News Digital at Freedom Fest in Las Vegas to discuss his unconventional rise, his reporting philosophy, and the stories the mainstream media is still ignoring.
NICK SHIRLEY EXPLAINS FRAUD 'ENTREPRENEURSHIP' HE SAYS IS RUNNING RAMPANT IN CA
"Well, when I was younger, I'd make vlog pranks, and then I started to get a little bit older and wanted to see what was happening in the world. And it turned into journalism," Shirley said about his start in reporting. "I didn't know it was journalism at the time. I thought I was just making YouTube videos on more interesting topics.
"And now I'm one of the biggest and most well-known journalists in America, in the world, actually."
Shirley conceded that his particular style is hard to define.
"I think that's a good mix, like an…independent YouTube journalist, like it's journalism with a bit of documentary style as well, so it's kind of different than what anyone has ever done before as far as this new realm of YouTube journalism," he said.
Shirley said he realized that he had an explosive story as the Minnesota fraud video "Feeding Our Future" scandal cracked nine-digit views on X.
YOUTUBER TO TESTIFY BEFORE CONGRESS ON MINNESOTA'S MASSIVE $9B FRAUD NETWORK INVESTIGATION
"When I saw it hit 100 million views, I had never seen a video get to 100 million views on X before. And then it became shared by some of the biggest voices in the world as well," said Shirley, who boasts 1.7 million followers on the platform, and nearly 2 million subscribers on YouTube.
Among them were Vice President J.D. Vance, Elon Musk and FBI Director Kash Patel.
Shirley said he believes in zeroing in his investigation on primary sources when he is devoting time and resources to new stories.
"I take all the information that's public from the government and I go straight to the source," he said.
Despite the massive success Shirley has seen, he still comes across stories that do not get the exposure he feels is warranted.
"On a national level, I think the fentanyl crisis in the United States is really bad," Shirley said. "I've done a few videos on that, but people seem to not want to stop the fentanyl crisis from happening."
OWNER OF DAYCARE IN VIRAL NICK SHIRLEY VIDEO CHARGED IN $4.6M FRAUD SCHEME, PROSECUTORS SAY
Unsurprisingly, from time to time, Shirley said his journalistic work takes him to the limits of his comfort zone.
"In the favelas of Brazil, I thought I was going to die. That was a little scary," he said. "In Kenya and Philadelphia as well, that was pretty dangerous."
Shirley cited his Spanish language skills as a motivating factor in his coverage of the Biden administration border crisis, which he witnessed firsthand.
"I had heard about what was happening. I was living in Chile at the time. And I started to see what was happening with Venezuelan migrants coming into Chile," Shirley said. "When I came back to the United States, I started looking into what was going on at the southern border.
"And since I could speak Spanish, I started to reveal what was actually happening. And people didn't know that children were being smuggled. 17-year-old girls were coming over all by themselves. 12-year-old girls were all coming over all by themselves. And I kind of started to showcase what was happening from the border all the way to the shelters in New York City."
Shirley did a two-year mission with the LDS Church, and credits his faith as a motivation for his work.
"Well, I think our faith invites us to look for the truth and expose evil," he said. "Like, the scriptures, the Bible, everything, it's a bunch of strong men exposing what's happening as well, and I think that's kind of lost."
Shirley said the recent guilty plea of Fahima Egeh Mahamud — the woman tied to Minnesota's massive "Feeding Our Future" scandal and daycare fraud scheme — as evidence of the veracity of his work, as the mainstream media and Democratic establishment have worked hard to discredit his investigations.
"Well, numbers don't lie, and convictions don't lie either," he said. "The largest daycare in Minnesota, government funded, just pleaded guilty today."
WWE star adds to her legacy with 'built in the front & stacked in the back' explanation for locker room nudity
WWE Superstar Natalya Neidhart, aka Nattie, has, or at least had, a habit of hanging out in the locker room completely naked. According to retired wrestler Brandi Rhodes, she would just stand there with her phone in hand.
She would even give an occasional lesson to a fellow wrestler in the buff. Her lack of clothing and her explanation for not putting any on are now part of her legacy after it was brought up on Rhodes' show "A Shot of Brandi."
"When I was in the locker room with you back, this is so long ago... Back in the day. You were always naked. Are you always naked?" Rhodes said.
"When she was being naked, this is what she would do. I’m telling you, she would do this. She would have her phone, be totally naked... But it was like F-ing with everybody. Just to be like 'my physique is so great. Just look at it.'"
Why did the third-generation member of the Hart wrestling family, the daughter of Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart and the niece of Bret "The Hitman" Hart, hang out in the locker room naked?
Because why not? Nattie explained, "Listen, I think it was because, why I probably was naked in the locker room, is because if you’re built in the front and stacked in the back, you may as well just let it all hang out."
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That's as good of a reason as you're going to find. It's a tip of the cap to a time in wrestling when a lack of clothing was sometimes used to tell a story. To connect to the audience. To give that sense of authenticity.
Nattie let it all hang out so often that she forgot that she was naked while going over a match with another wrestler.
"Poor Eve Torres. I was going over a match with her once, and I was trying to correct her on some forearms," she said.
"I was like, 'You've got to throw your hips into it. Every kind of sport, it’s all coming from the [hips]. 'And Eve’s like, 'Nattie, put something on.'"
That's solid advice and an even better overall story. Nattie could have danced around the naked locker room story and downplayed it. She chose to lean into it, and that's what the legends do.
Mamdani calls out Democratic Party as 'well-paid consultants and big money interests'
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani claimed Tuesday to Rolling Stone magazine that the Democratic Party has become "run by well-paid consultants and big money interests."
During an interview, Mamdani was asked about a comment from former Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chair Jaime Harrison after candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) defeated incumbent politicians in a primary election last month despite previously attacking the party.
"I say this with no ill will or animosity: if you hate the Democratic Party, then please don’t run for our nomination. Don’t use our resources. Don’t rely on our volunteers. Don’t use our infrastructure. Don’t ask Democrats to invest their time, money, and energy in your campaign. Focus on building the party you actually support," Harrison wrote on X.
"Political parties aren’t perfect, but they’re built by millions of people who knock doors, make calls, organize meetings, and fight for the values they believe in. If you don’t believe in the party, then don’t ask its members to carry you across the finish line."
FLASHBACK: MAMDANI'S HISTORY OF DODGING QUESTIONS ABOUT WHERE HE STANDS ON KEY ISSUES
In response, Mamdani said, "I think usually if someone says this is not of any ill will or animosity, what they're about to say is characterized by ill will and animosity."
He emphasized that the Democratic Party needs to be beholden to the voters who have voiced their support for socialist candidates.
"You say that that is not representative of the party. It may not be representative of what has effectively become our party, which is something that's run by well-paid consultants and big money interests, but it is representative of what Democrats themselves want to see," Mamdani said.
ZOHRAN MAMDANI ADMITS HE WANTS TO END HIS ‘ONE-SIDED BEEF’ ABOUT TAXES WITH RAPPER 50 CENT
"And it's representative of the fact that, in this country, there is just one majority and that's of the working class. And that's not just true in this city. It's not just true in another city. It's true across the entirety of our nation. And people want to see a party that understands that and fights for that."
Fox News Digital reached out to the DNC for comment.
Mamdani previously criticized the Democratic Party for having "lost its focus on working people" during an interview last month and pushed for more efforts to be done to combat high prices.
"You know, you look at the four freedoms. You look at the real core of the New Deal. There was a moment when this party was unabashed about its focus on working people. And I'm excited to bring it back there," Mamdani said.
However, over the weekend, Mamdani struggled to offer a clear definition of who qualifies as the "working class." He described the working class as "those who are working to try and afford the basic dignities of life and aren’t able to do so" and drew a line at "about a million dollars a year."
House Republicans move to make Trump's border policies permanent
A sweeping border security bill aimed at permanently codifying several of President Donald Trump's executive actions is headed to the House floor after clearing a key committee on Tuesday.
The House Judiciary Committee advanced the Permanent Trump Secure Border Act along party lines during an hours-long markup Tuesday over the fierce objections of Democratic lawmakers.
The legislation, authored by Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, would criminalize visa overstays and increase penalties for unlawful entry, would effectively end "catch and release" policies by requiring most illegal migrants to be detained or returned while their cases are pending and tighten asylum eligibility and humanitarian parole, among other provisions.
The measure would also bolster Customs and Border Protection (CBP) by directing the Department of Homeland Security to modernize border facilities, expand staffing and workforce planning and deploy more surveillance technology, including drones, radar systems, biometric screening and DNA collection.
'AMERICA FIRST' IMMIGRATION OVERHAUL BILL WOULD CODIFY TRUMP'S CAMPAIGN PROMISES ONCE AND FOR ALL
House conservatives for months have pressed GOP leaders to permanently codify Trump's border agenda as illegal border crossings have fallen to historic lows during his second term. Republicans argue that without congressional action, many of the policies could be reversed by a future president.
"We want to make sure that if you ever, God forbid, get another Joe Biden-type president who's just going to open the border, that makes it much tougher for him to do what he did," House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, told Fox News Digital.
Democrats opposed the measure, arguing any border security legislation must also address reforms to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and expand pathways for legal immigration.
"We've been urging the majority to set aside the demonization of immigrants to pass comprehensive, commonsense immigration reform on a bipartisan basis," House Judiciary Committee ranking member Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said during debate.
Tuesday’s vote comes after House conservatives kept the floor frozen for several weeks in June and July in protest of GOP leaders failing to move border security legislation.
"We need to deliver on codifying border security, deal with the birthright citizenship issue," Roy told reporters earlier in July.
"These are all issues people that I represent care about intently and that we've talked about doing, and we need to deliver," he said.
Despite clearing committee, the legislation could face resistance on the House floor from some moderate Republicans seeking temporary legal protections for agricultural workers.
The measure closely mirrors H.R. 2, House Republicans’ border security bill passed during the Biden administration, but omits a nationwide E-Verify mandate that has long divided Republicans.
Some GOP lawmakers are also advocating for a floor vote curtailing birthright citizenship after the Supreme Court rejected the Trump administration’s attempts to limit the practice.
In the House, Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., has also unveiled legislation, the Anchors Away Act, that would restrict birthright citizenship to babies with at least one parent with certain legal status and grant the federal government authority to deny entry to pregnant foreigners.
"I refuse to let these anchor babies colonize our country," Ogles previously told Fox News Digital.
Slack messages released by Rand Paul appear to show authors of key COVID-19 origin paper held private doubts
Newly released messages among the authors of a widely cited paper regarding the origins of COVID-19 privately raised doubts that the virus originated from bats, as their paper stated.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., on Tuesday released the internal Slack messages exchanged among the authors of "The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2" — Kristian Andersen, Robert Garry, Eddie Holmes and Andrew Rambaut.
"The idea that it came from a lab is implausible, and, yet, privately they're saying the opposite. … This level of dishonesty, I think, needs to be exposed," Paul told Fox News. "These are people who get large, multimillion-dollar grants from our country, and we shouldn't be giving money to people who lied to us."
The paper was published in Nature Medicine in March 2020 and was widely cited by public health officials and the media as the scientific authority for ruling out a laboratory origin of SARS-CoV-2. However, the released messages appear to show that its authors were less certain than their public conclusions suggested.
Some raised concerns that the virus originated in a lab.
Andersen assigned a 30% probability to a lab origin, while Holmes gave an estimate of 20%, though he later revised that to 10%. Either way, both figures contrast with the paper's public assertion that the virus had not been manipulated.
"The part I’m really struggling with is that, at the end of the day, we really don’t have any hard evidence one way or the other — and especially given some of the recent evidence, we also can’t rule out that somebody actually put it in there," Andersen wrote on June 11, 2020, according to the documents.
"That’s obviously not to say that somebody did, but we can’t rule it out. Our paper was pretty strong in saying ‘there’s no way,’ but I have less confidence in that statement at this stage."
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The documents also reveal internal debates over the furin cleavage site, the genetic feature at the heart of the lab-leak question. At one point, Andersen told colleagues that "some smoking(ish) guns" had emerged that made him "not comfortable" and that he had "less confidence ... at this stage," a news release from Paul's office states.
In addition, the authors coordinated with the U.S. intelligence community and National Institutes of Health (NIH) leadership as they were publicly defending their conclusions. Another topic of discussion among the authors was Ralph Baric, a prominent coronavirus researcher.
While they acknowledged his expertise, their internal messages revealed a highly contentious relationship with him, characterized by professional rivalry and suspicions that he actively tried to undermine them.
They also suspected Baric was the anonymous leaker, whom they dubbed "Deep Throat," who shared confidential peer-review information with a journalist. The leak suggested that the authors initially suspected a lab origin before changing their minds.
A World Health Organization (WHO) scientific advisory group released a report last year on the origins of COVID-19, concluding that the deadly pandemic was caused by "zoonotic spillover," either directly from bats or through an intermediate host.
On Monday, Paul released documents that revealed U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents were preparing to question British zoologist Peter Daszak upon his return to the United States from the World Health Organization’s investigation into the origins of COVID-19, before the FBI intervened and asked agents to stand down.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the face of the U.S. response to the pandemic, is slated to testify before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on the origins of the virus this month after a subpoena was issued by Paul, the committee chairperson.
Fauci has been accused by some of manipulating intelligence on the origins of the pandemic and lying to Congress to cover up alleged wrongdoing.
WATCH: Smithsonian director pressed on woke exhibits: ‘Is Mickey Mouse racist?’
The director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History faced pointed questions from House Republicans Tuesday over exhibits and materials they characterized as woke, including a display linking Mickey Mouse to racism and a museum toolkit discussing "objectivity" as a feature of White supremacy.
Several Republican members questioned Director Anthea Hartig about sexually explicit imagery in exhibits, including "bondage," in the words of Chairman Tim Burchett, R-Tenn. Texas Rep.
Brandon Gill’s exchanges focused on one of America’s most iconic childhood characters.
"Is Mickey Mouse racist?" Gill asked Hartig about halfway through his allotted five minutes.
WATCH: SMITHSONIAN HISTORY MUSEUM DIRECTOR STUMBLES OVER BASIC QUESTIONS ON SEX: ‘I’M NOT SURE’
"Mickey Mouse is not racist," Hartig replied.
Gill responded by pointing to a Smithsonian Institution exhibit that described Steamboat Willie as representing "vestiges of long-standing traditions of blackface minstrelsy’."
"Would you describe that as racist?" Gill pressed.
Hartig began explaining the "historical trajectory" of Mickey Mouse before brief crosstalk. She then finished, saying, "[He’s] rooted in minstrelsy."
When Gill asked whether the purported racist overtones were "problematic," Hartig responded that it was not her role to make that determination.
Gill also cited the MASS Action Toolkit, a mid-2010s anthology for museums that references the 2014 Ferguson, Missouri, police shooting and subsequent Black Lives Matter protests, and asked Hartig whether it was important to be "polite."
Gill then cited passages from the toolkit discussing "objectivity" and politeness in relation to White supremacy culture. He asked Hartig whether the guide's characterization implied she was a White supremacist.
"Can you help me square why your organization says that being polite is part of being a White supremacist?" Gill added. Hartig replied she could not immediately recall that passage.
Gill also asked Hartig whether it was important to be objective.
After Hartig answered largely in the affirmative, Gill pointed to the toolkit’s discussion of objectivity.
A 2017 copy of the toolkit available online stated that "Jones and Okun also list objectivity as a characteristic of a White supremacy culture. This encompasses repressing emotions in decision-making or group processes, thinking in a linear fashion, impatience with those who do not exhibit linear thinking or with thinking that does not appear logical."
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"Museum staff have never been objective, but because dominant norms typically coincide with the worldview of the vast majority of museum staff, it has appeared to be objective to the dominant culture. Those with worldviews outside of the dominant culture are hyperaware of the fallacy in this pretense of museum objectivity," the toolkit went on.
When asked whether the characterization concerned her, Hartig replied, "It’s not our toolkit."
Gill said the Smithsonian had promoted the toolkit for years.
New York Democrat hopes Mamdani won't be 'arresting anyone' after recent Netanyahu comments
Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., told CNN Monday he hopes New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani does not make any effort to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu despite his past comments.
Meeks was asked by "The Situation Room" host Wolf Blitzer about reports that Mamdani is looking into the possibility of arresting Netanyahu if he visits New York City for the United Nations General Assembly in September.
Stepping away from Mamdani, Meeks emphasized that "all leaders" are welcome to speak at the United Nations and encouraged the New York City mayor to not try to disrupt the U.N.'s purpose.
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"Look, the United Nations is for all leaders to come to the United States, for them to have a chance to talk to the collective body, whether you agree with them or not," Meeks said.
"I have had, on other sides with other folks, to say that they should have had the right to come to the U.N., and they did, to speak to the United Nations in that regard. And people have the right to speak out loudly against what they may say and represent. That’s fine. But I think the mayor has also walked that back some.
"I saw a quote where he said that he does not intend to violate federal law, existing law and looking for other laws, as President [Donald] Trump sometimes does, you know, tries to go around the law, and that he understands that the U.N.’s functions need to continue to move forward, and let the UN takes care of its business. And, so, I think that the mayor should make sure that he’s not arresting anyone at this point."
NETANYAHU FIRES BACK AT NYC MAYOR MAMDANI'S VOW TO ENFORCE 'BOGUS ARREST WARRANT'
Fox News Digital reached out to Mamdani's office for comment.
In remarks first reported by The New York Times, Mamdani called Netanyahu a "war criminal" who "belongs in The Hague" and said his administration is in an "active conversation" with the city's Law Department over what legal authority New York City possesses should the Israeli prime minister travel to the Big Apple.
"Whatever the law allows me to do in New York City, that’s what we will do," Mamdani said, adding that his administration would not write new laws for that purpose.
MAMDANI’S ‘DERANGED’ ISRAEL TAKE RESURFACES AS HE TARGETS NETANYAHU
The International Criminal Court (ICC) originally issued arrest warrants against Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in November 2024, over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity tied to Israel's military campaign in Gaza.
Israel has rejected the allegations and disputes the court's jurisdiction. In addition, the U.S. is not a party to the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC, meaning it does not have the same arrest-and-surrender obligation that applies to ICC member states.
Rabid bat found near zoo restaurant sparks urgent public health warning: 'Extremely serious'
Visitors to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park are being urged to come forward if they had contact with a wild bat after the animal tested positive for rabies.
A deceased wild bat was recovered outside the Oasis on the Rocks restaurant July 11. It later tested positive for rabies, according to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park.
"Safari Park visitors who had no physical contact with the bat are not at risk for rabies," the park told Fox News Digital.
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County health officials are asking anyone who may have had direct contact with the bat to come forward for evaluation.
The bat was not part of the Safari Park's animal collection, and officials said no human contact has been reported.
The bat was tested by the County Public Health Laboratory, which confirmed it was positive for rabies, San Diego County noted.
This marks the 19th bat to test positive for rabies in San Diego County this year. Twenty-one bats tested positive during all of 2025, according to county officials.
"Rabies is an extremely serious viral disease, one of the deadliest, with [a] nearly 100% fatality [rate] if not caught early enough," Dr. Ankita Kadakia, the county's deputy public health officer, said in a statement.
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"We are investigating to ensure anyone who came into contact with the bat receives care quickly. Once symptoms start, there is no treatment for rabies."
Wildlife experts say the incident serves as a reminder that people should never handle bats, even though they play an important role in the environment.
"There are over 20 different species of bats living in San Diego County, and these animals are a huge benefit to our region's gardens and farms, eating up to 1,000 mosquito-sized bugs per hour," Dr. Alexis Wohl, wildlife veterinary manager at the San Diego Humane Society, told Fox News Digital.
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"Although it's rare for bats to carry rabies, it is important to exercise caution and not handle them with bare hands," Wohl said.
Dr. Brian Collins, a veterinarian with the Cornell Riney Canine Health Center, based in New York, said bats are one of the primary carriers of rabies in the United States and account for most human rabies cases.
"If a bat is encountered in public, it is very important not to touch it," Collins told Fox News Digital.
Instead, he recommended keeping people and pets away from the animal and notifying property management, animal control or local law enforcement.
"If you know or suspect that you have had physical contact with the bat, you should wash the affected area with soap and water for 10 to 15 minutes," Collins said.
Maher mocks liberals for still panicking about Trump's antics, personality after 10 years
Talk show host Bill Maher mocked liberals on Monday, saying many of them are constantly panicking about President Donald Trump’s surface-level antics and behavior that do not really impact their lives.
During a discussion on his "Club Random" podcast with British comedian Jack Whitehall, Maher jokingly pointed to a framed list of all of Trump’s insults toward him as a "great artifact of history." Maher had brought this list of nearly 60 insults to the White House and had Trump sign it when they met for dinner in March 2025.
Maher offered backhanded praise for Trump for having allegedly tried to prevent him from receiving the Mark Twain Prize at the Kennedy Center last month, suggesting he was flattered to be taken so seriously. Maher doubled down on Monday.
"I didn't think it was ever going to happen," Maher said of receiving the award. "Because first he tried to stop it, but then it was going through, and then they took his name off the building. He didn't like it. When they took his name off the building, he covered the building in drapery so you couldn't see anything on the building. I'm not kidding."
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"I don't care," Maher said of Trump’s antics. "If, at this point, ten years into the Trump situation, you are still obsessing about his personality, my view is that's on you."
"Should we always be criticizing, as I do, what he actually does while he's in office? Absolutely," Maher continued. "But to keep just focusing on these personality things that we've talked about for ten years — they're not going to change. That's who he is. I don't care when he calls me names now. It's the way he does it. It's the way he talks. It's who he is."
"When he does it, I just got to go, ‘OK, yeah. This is what you do.’ And as long as it's something that doesn't really affect me or other people for real," he said.
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Maher went on to list a litany of other surface-level Trump controversies that ultimately do not impact the everyday lives of Americans like himself, arguing they are absurd topics for people to get worked up over.
"I don't care about your reflecting pool," he said. "I don't care about your ballroom. I don't care what you do on the lawn. You can have UFC fights. You can have sheep grazing there like one president did. You can do anything. Pickleball. I don't give a s--- what you do on the lawn."
"And if you're a person who does, you're just way too into Donald Trump as the person who controls how you think in life," Maher continued. "Everything is about him. I'm not going there with you."
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"I'm winning," Maher said of his mindset. "And I'm somebody he attacks personally, and I care less than you do. Your life is all about Donald Trump. Mine isn't."
Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett tried to call Argentina racist during the World Cup and embarrassed herself
Leave it to Representative Jasmine Crockett to be so obsessed with race-baiting that she accidentally spent an afternoon carrying water for the Spanish Empire.
In her rush to lecture the world about racism, Crockett somehow landed on the side of the country that spent centuries colonizing much of Latin America.
During a House hearing on oversight of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, the Texas Democrat tried to turn World Cup fandom into a debate about racism.
SPAIN BEATS ARGENTINA TO WIN 2026 FIFA WORLD CUP BEHIND FERRAN TORRES' EXTRA-TIME GOAL
Instead, Yale historian Dr. David Blight offered the explanation most sports fans would.
WATCH:
Rep. Jasmine Crockett: "The World Cup that captured the imaginations of the entire world when they saw all of these people of color that was playing for all these teams. And ultimately, if you recall, the last two teams, it was Argentina and Spain. And it seemed like the vast majority of the world was rooting for Argentina or actually against Argentina, right? And why was that? Just give me an explanation if you could guess..."
Dr. David Blight: "Spain had the best team, maybe that's why they were rooting for them."
Rep. Jasmine Crockett: "There's also a racist history that exists as it relates to Argentina."
Crockett saw racism. Dr. Blight saw soccer.
Crockett was so determined to paint Argentina as uniquely racist that she ended up siding with Spain, the historical seat of Western European colonialism. It is the kind of historically illiterate self-own that would deeply upset the Democratic base, if they actually knew their history.
On one side was a world-renowned Ivy League historian stating the obvious: fans usually root for the better team.
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On the other was a sitting member of Congress suggesting the world's reaction to the World Cup final was driven, at least in part, by Argentina's racial history.
By Crockett's logic, even watching the World Cup is an act of political expression.
Every penalty kick has to double as a political statement, even if it means pretending Spain was somehow the good guy.
It's the kind of performative political theater she's built her brand on. Watching her in Congress is like scrolling through the Facebook feed of the auntie who fires off unhinged political rants. The only difference is she has a congressional badge, a taxpayer-funded microphone, and far more influence than your aunt.
When a Yale historian has to remind a member of Congress that people usually root for the better team, you've probably overthought the World Cup.
It takes real ideological commitment to walk into a discussion about soccer and walk out carrying water for the Spanish Empire without noticing the irony.
Dems gonna Dem.
Send us your thoughts: alejandro.avila@outkick.com / Follow along on X: @alejandroaveela