Behind The Scenes Of The Great Debate: TPUSA Is The Biggest Loser. | Ep 376 | Candace Owens Transcript

Candace Owens recaps her debate with Andrew Wilson and delivers a post-mortem on Turning Point USA

Candace Owens reviews the lead-up, conduct, and aftermath of her live debate with Andrew Wilson, whom she identifies as a surrogate for Turning Point USA and Erika Kirk.

Summary

Candace Owens delivers a solo episode recapping her debate with Andrew Wilson, framing it as a proxy battle with Turning Point USA under Erika Kirk's leadership. She details a chaotic and, in her view, deliberately disrespectful pre-debate negotiation process — including anonymous communications, last-minute demands, and the undisclosed arrival of Steven Crowder's team (specifically Gerald Morgan) at her home in violation of agreed filming restrictions. During the debate itself, she highlights Wilson's inability to engage seriously with the evidence, his repeated confident misstatements and attempts to gaslight her in real time, and his concession that he was only 75–85% certain of Tyler Robinson's guilt — which Owens argues constitutes reasonable doubt, undermining his own debate claim that the evidence was "overwhelming." She also details Wilson's fixation on the term "positive evidence" as an intellectual pose, his attempt to legally entrap her into making a defamatory statement on record regarding Erika Kirk, and his extended argument about the Utah Rule 1102 — which Owens says he fundamentally failed to understand. She addresses the post-debate reaction, including Wilson's claim that AI declared him the winner, his wife's suggestion that Owens was fed answers through an earpiece, and widespread mockery from both left and right. Owens also argues that Wilson's prioritization of defending Israel over proving his own debate claim is itself suspicious, and closes by promising a follow-up episode with additional disclosures about Turning Point USA.

Key Takeaways

FULL TRANSCRIPT

Opening: Debate Recap and TPUSA's Performance

Candace Owens: Happy Monday, everyone. I am extra happy this Monday because of the great debate. My oh my. Honestly, if we're being honest, it was over the minute that Andrew Wilson began reading his so-called opening statement from his phone. I was half expecting him to just say, "And this message was brought to you by Turning Point USA." Just terrible. Terrible.

Without question, the biggest losers were Erika Kirk, Andrew Kolvet, Blake Neff, and the Turning Point USA organization more broadly, because we seem to be reaching a new depth of their PR disaster. Could it get any worse? They brought that guy in to train Turning Point USA students how to debate. He's going to teach them the strategy of debate. They actually paid him to teach them. So they went from Charlie Kirk to a chain-smoking debate bro with a very shaky boot. Like I said, they are the biggest losers. I personally think the organization is over. There can't be much coming back from that — who they're now hitching their wagon to. Erika Kirk, CEO and chairwoman, ruined this organization in under a year, which is incredible. And it's because the queen sent an absolute joker.

Pre-Debate Negotiations: Anonymous Emails and Burner Phones

Let me just express that I truly feel disrespected. I feel disrespected because there is no organization that knows better than Turning Point USA does that I was trained to debate by Charlie Kirk — across country, across too many college campuses, just hours and hours and hours while we were traveling, note cards, learning how to debate, what not to do. So it's just like, how dare they send me Andrew Wilson. Really? This is the new person coaching the students? This is who they think is going to take me down? He goes into TPUSA headquarters in June, comes out, and suddenly thinks — he's a billionaire dropping my name. "Oh, she's too afraid to debate me." Okay.

Let me give you guys a little bit of backstory here. You should just know what happened leading up to this, because it will give you a better sense of what the organization has become — what we all notice has nothing to do with who Charlie was. Understanding the lead-up to this moment, the lead-up to the great debate, will help furnish the answer of the strategy that Erika Kirk employs as the new CEO and leader.

I am not in any way exaggerating when I say that I have never in my life, amongst friend or foe organizations, dealt with a more unprofessional team than Andrew's team in my entire career — ever, anywhere — leading up to them arriving at my house.

First, just to back it up: you will recall that Andrew Wilson demanded that I publicly negotiate the terms of the agreement on X. He wanted to tweet back and forth. It was excruciating. He wanted to make sure that I couldn't change the terms. I was like, "Why don't we take this to email? We could just go back and forth." He said, "No, this must be negotiated publicly, please." He literally refused to email like a normal human being until we agreed to the debate claim — until we agreed to the format, 3.5 hours minimum — until I accepted that. And that took about a day and a half of non-stop back and forth, which to me is quite childish.

We agreed, of course, that he could also bring a video guy because he was paranoid, to ensure that there were no surprises — like we were going to do some sort of a gotcha. Who was in his ear telling him any of this was necessary? I don't know. But I did find out. We also agreed, as you saw publicly, that he could bring his own fact checkers. Essentially, he's coming with a party of four. We agreed that he could pick the moderator, etc. We basically folded on everything because I just said, "I'm down for this debate."

And then, once it was excruciatingly and publicly negotiated and we were finally able to move to discussions behind the scenes, we start an email chain. I am provided with no identity as to who I am communicating with. We're basically emailing the so-called Crucible team. I'm like, "Who is this? Who am I speaking with? Why is there no name behind the emails?" Even when we asked, "Who am I speaking to?" they're just being shady for no reason. It's like a faceless email chain. We have all of our names on there, so they know exactly who's calling the shots, who's being looped in. We've got nothing.

So whoever this anonymous email person or people were, they then declare that they would like a contract and an escrow account for the funds. Okay, not totally off the mark, but it's going to be hard — not exactly easy — to find a bank that approves an escrow account, open it, get lawyers involved by Friday. They then indicate that they're okay if it's my lawyer's account. Fine. I have my lawyer begin drafting a very simple contract, which basically spells out exactly what we've agreed to publicly.

And suddenly, we receive an email from the Crucible team essentially saying, "Never mind. Joe Rogan has now made an offer to host this discussion down in Texas." So, and I'm quoting this: "This changes everything. Let's just blow up the negotiations — let's blow up everything that we made you painfully agree to publicly — because Joe Rogan will reach more people than your platform."

Now they're asking me to travel to Texas. They offer me a luxury car to accommodate my pregnancy, and I say no. I say no unless Joe would like to come to Nashville, because it does not change everything. It actually changes nothing, and I'm not going to deal. It's already been a painful process. I'm not taking myself through that again, plus pushing the date back and having to be in communication with this team for weeks on end because you're a fan of Joe Rogan. I like Joe Rogan too, but I only had two conditions here — everything else we'd conceded to. I said I don't want to travel. Not because I can't travel pregnant — I do, I can and I do travel. I just don't want to travel to this ankle biter who's up there saying, "I'll do it on your platform." Okay, put your money where your mouth is. The other condition I had was no smoking. No smoking, no traveling.

Anyway, they finally let that go, and I respectfully declined. When Joe reached out, he was very nice about it, totally understanding. Andrew then called PBD and asked him to moderate, because Michael Knowles said he wasn't going to moderate. I immediately said, "Give me your second, third, fourth option so we can start reaching out to people." Andrew reached out to PBD.

Around this time, the so-called Crucible team begins renegotiating what we've already publicly agreed to, asserting that they want a guaranteed 90 minutes to basically sit me through a deposition where he can just go at me and ask me questions and I have to answer his questions about things that I have said outside of our debate claims. We'd already addressed that publicly and I said no. I said, "I'm happy to answer your questions once we have exhausted our debate claims, but we're not going to have you sitting down and deposing me." I actually recommended via email, "If you want that to happen, you're going to have to pass the bar and join Brigitte Macron's prosecution team against me. If that's what you're aspiring to do — sit me down for a deposition — you have to become a lawyer and join her team."

And PBD — I'm going crazy here — he is the one who agreed to all of this publicly, made me do this publicly, and is now trying to change things. So at that point, since PBD accepted being the moderator, he suggested that everyone get on a FaceTime call to work through these details. We have basically an emergency FaceTime call on Tuesday evening. Suddenly, Andrew's acting differently. I think just having the presence of me now looping in PBD on these emails, he's like, "Oh, yeah, no, it's fine. I don't need to ask her questions or do anything like that or add that to the contract. I just want to make sure that there will be time for me to address, generally speaking, some of her conspiracies." And I said over and over again, "I don't mind answering your questions. We're going to be dialoguing — you're not sitting me down and questioning me. I want to make sure we first and foremost address the case. That's what people are here to listen to."

I explained in detail on this call — and PBD has two members from his team on the call as well, Tom as well as his executive assistant — I explained in detail that my house is very small. I explained why we are not allowing them to film anywhere but inside of this exact studio. My kids live here. They homeschool here. This is something you just have to respect, but I understand you're paranoid. We have a very small, formerly HVAC closet control room, but we will create a spot to address your paranoia for your team. They will be able to listen, they'll be able to hear everything, so that you know there's no funny business going on, and you're welcome to record within the studio so that in the event that we try to trick you or do something, you will have captured it. He's fine with that. He gets off the phone, we get off the phone, everything is done. Contract gets officially signed on Thursday.

What could possibly go wrong? You're thinking, right, because tomorrow is Friday. Well, sometime on Thursday, my producer says it's kind of weird that we don't have a point of contact. We are still dealing with a faceless team. No one has reached out to ask for our address. We also need the names because we have security and we need to know who they're bringing. So the faceless people have to become real people. We end up asking PBD's team to provide us a number for Andrew Wilson. We get a number and Andrew says reach out to this number, which seemingly belongs to no one. They will not identify themselves. So my producer is now texting an anonymous somebody. We try to run the number to figure out who we're speaking to. It appears to be a burner phone. The person — I guess they want to surprise us with who they're bringing to the house.

I can't even imagine this scenario where someone has expressed to you, "My children live here, they sleep here. This is our personal home." Over the course of this conversation with this faceless individual, the person immediately begins getting rude with my producer and insisting — again, this is on Thursday, the night before — that they're going to need a desk. They're going to need a place to set up Andrew's live stream. They're saying they're now going to need an HDMI cable running out of our studio into the control room so they can set up a computer into a camera and live stream. They need access to power.

And I almost lost it. I said, "We have never agreed to allow them to set up a live stream in our home, to bring a desk and an HDMI cable. What are we even talking about?" The person replies that they thought it was implied because our contract says the debate will be live streamed. Yeah, the debate is going to be live streamed like my show is live streamed every day — because you thought we were going to trick you and put it behind a paywall. Why would you think that implies that you can set up a mini studio in my home after I've gone through such pains to express to both you and PBD's team how small the space is and how we don't have any room?

When did this anonymous team decide to email us about this assumption rather than trying to force my producer to just accommodate them? 9:15 p.m. the night before. 9:15 p.m. the night before the debate, with a follow-up email sent at 11:15 p.m. And still at no point will they identify who the four people are, despite the fact that we asked multiple times in email and via text who they're bringing into my home where my children lay their heads.

So it's now debate day. We still get no answers, no identity of who they're bringing. They want to surprise us — that's very apparent. And I just want to say I cannot comprehend how degenerate and disrespectful you have to be to do that. I would never do that to anybody no matter how I felt about them. So we just made sure that they were not welcomed through the front door — we normally just welcome everybody through the front door — and said they had to go through the back, through the basement door. Because why would I allow anyone to be so unnecessarily disrespectful?

Steven Crowder's Team Arrives Uninvited

Then we figure out why, and it starts to make sense, because he shows up with Steven Crowder's team. Steven Crowder's producer, CEO, regular on-air talent — a figure who spends all day mean-tweeting me. He's actually like the CEO of whatever it is Steven Crowder thinks he does anymore. If you don't know who Steven Crowder is, he's basically a child actor who never stopped being a child actor. He's a 40-year-old man who just likes to prank people. And this is exactly his brand — just doing something this disrespectful for no reason.

Gerald Morgan is who he brought. He was not rude to me, but could you imagine? Despite me detailing why we wanted no filming outside of this studio and saying you can film in the studio, Gerald decided to do a live call-in from my kids' playroom just outside the studio. It was one of the reasons we said no smoking. We made it clear to them my children's playroom, which is the garage area, is just outside and you can't smoke cigarettes. All of this was made clear. This was their big plan — to get views for Steven Crowder and to disrespect me.

I still am just amazed that this is something grown men would be plotting and planning for clicks and views. It's so disgusting. But at the very least, it allowed me to understand why there was so much paranoia, why there was all this weird communication, all this unnecessary scheming — because that's his brand. That is literally his brand. He's just not an honest dealer. He's a part of that bizarre group of middle-aged men who are fixated with me. I've just never been interested in Steven Crowder. I genuinely don't follow his stuff. I've never been on his show. That brand of never growing up and thinking it's funny to do pranks — it's not. Grow up.

His brand sort of crashed and burned when he was caught on a doorbell cam berating his eight-month pregnant, now ex-wife when she was pregnant with twins. He never really recovered from that. And so I guess the way he thought he would recover is by plotting against another very pregnant person — to sort of break into her house in a weird way so you could have inside scoop on a debate rather than just maturely emailing and saying, "I want to bring someone you don't like and someone who's been nasty to you online, but that's my prerogative." I would have said, "Yeah, you're right. It's your prerogative. Could you just make sure this person doesn't film here?" Whatever. They did not do that. And it was actually in complete violation of what we agreed to, because one thing the contract did stipulate was no filming outside of this studio.

Anyway, I kept it professional. We were kind to everyone, because if nothing else, it did give me the confidence to know that Andrew was surrounding himself and taking advice from very unserious people who like to play pranks. And I think we saw the fruits of that during the debate immediately — that was their plan, to sort of play tricks to win.

I do want to say, to be super fair: the team he had in the control room was very kind, very professional. Even Gerald was kind and professional to my face. But the exercise of what you're doing here is just a level of disrespect that I don't think I've ever dealt with. And if it wasn't for me knowingly moving out of this house in a couple of weeks, I probably would not want these kinds of people to know where I live, because you just don't have respect for children.

The Debate Begins: Wilson's Opening Statement and the Kirk Text Message

Now, regarding the debate — by the time Andrew Wilson whipped out his phone and read that opening statement, it was clear to me that he was going to lose. As soon as he said the much-trafficked quotation of "you're going off vibes and dreams and no evidence," I knew that he was completely unfamiliar with my content. He just decided to go to Turning Point and say, "I'll do this," and had done no research.

I also had this micro-win because earlier I had said that one of the terms I wanted — that I ended up conceding — was that I wanted Turning Point to claim their horse. I wanted them to say, "This is our guy." He said he didn't want that done. We all knew he was being sent by Erika and company, but he refused that term and said he had nothing to do with them. And then in the first three minutes of the debate, he makes it perfectly clear that Turning Point USA is backing him with this totally awkward "I have a never-before-seen message" — wherein he just kind of makes Erika Kirk look like a big fat liar. Take a listen.

Andrew Wilson: "I hold in my possession never-before-seen messages from Charlie Kirk to his security team on September 9th, 2025. I'm going to share the message with you today, which is the first time this information has ever been publicly revealed.

On September 9th, Charlie's security team wrote to him: 'Yes, law enforcement has been fully supportive and agreed to the security plan and posture. Tomorrow's event will be covered by both my team and the campus PD. If additional support is required, patrol units will be available. I have 11 on site.' Charlie responded with this: 'Okay, great. Remind them that they are there for one person's security only, because I'm somewhat worried the left is trying to kill me.' That was a message sent September 9th.

We knew there was always going to be a threat, but Charlie and I always promised each other we would never live in fear. And he would say, 'If they're going to get me, they're going to get me.' But he was not messaging people the day before saying, 'I'm going to be murdered. They're coming after me. Someone's going to kill me.' He didn't say that. And I have his cell phone."

Candace Owens: For those of you who watch this show, that was the original Turning Point USA sin. That was the first episode I did going after Erika, and I explained to people that she was lying. I said, "She's lying. There's no way that I know that this text message exists and was sent from Dan Flood and she doesn't." This is in December — in December she's joining Glenn Beck and asserting that she has his phone. And then Turning Point tried to claim — we met days after, because that's when I went, "This is weird." Days after that is when Erika then came to Nashville and we had this summit. And what she told me — which is how Andrew is making a very, very bad mistake here — she said, "Well, it was on Signal, and the team's messages auto-delete on Signal, and she didn't know." So I guess Dan Flood didn't tell her. I guess Andrew Kolvet, who was giving messages he thought were relevant to the police, didn't think to give them a message that said "the left is going to kill me."

But particularly when we sat down, she was like, "Have you seen the message?" And I said no. And she said, "Oh, it said 'the left' and it was on Signal." And I told you guys that was a double lie. She lied again. The message was actually sent on iMessage. Well, Andrew says he's going to be dropping this message — because he actually didn't want to show the message for some reason. He wanted this big, weird opening where people would go crazy. And everyone just thought it was really strange for Turning Point USA not to have presented that message. If they really had a message that said this, their entire narrative has been "the left killed Charlie Kirk." Why wouldn't you share that? That seems weird. Why didn't you share that with authorities when you were sharing messages?

And Andrew — we're supposed to believe he didn't tell her for four months, but he told me in September, and Erika went on Glenn Beck to debunk me and say I was a liar. And now it's just looking real bad for Turning Point USA. So fingers crossed, because I always have a surprise — fingers crossed that Andrew, who has promised he's going to release this on his show because he's got evidence, actually does release that message, which is supposed to be on Signal but I know for a fact is on iMessage.

The Debate: Reasonable Doubt and Wilson's 75% Admission

Anyway, moving on. As soon as the actual debate begins, I sort of declined to do an opening statement because it was just weird that he did that — it had nothing to do with the debate claims. It was just taking cheap shots at me. The first thing he does is concede that there's reasonable doubt that Tyler Robinson did this. PBD asks us explicitly what percentage we put this at. And here is what Andrew Wilson says.

PBD: "Just out of curiosity, are you between 0 to 100? What is the likelihood that you think Tyler Robinson shot Charlie Kirk and killed him?"

Andrew Wilson: "Based on the evidence right now, I'd say 75 to 85%."

Candace Owens: Okay, I win the debate. So I guess the evidence is not so overwhelming. We went from "overwhelming" to 75%. That's reasonable doubt. Let this man off. What are we even talking about? Who has ever said, "Yeah, 75% — that was overwhelming"? Hey, how would you rate that restaurant? "Like 75% — I was overwhelmed with how delicious the food was, and I put it at 75%." What are we talking about? Why are we here?

And I realized that he didn't really know why he was here. He didn't have any sort of debate strategy other than to lie with confidence. It was just amazing to me how many times this man thought he could just lie — not only about things that were happening in the case, but also about what was happening currently in the room during the debate. Like, we're sitting there and he just was like, "I'm a wizard. I have a magic wand and I can just convince audiences they didn't or did just hear something that happened five seconds ago." It was bonkers.

The amount of people who were like, "This is a strong sign of somebody with narcissistic personality disorder — to confidently lie and try to gaslight you." Take a listen to just two times he did this.

Andrew Wilson: "You wrote the car pulling in — that's a totally blurry image. Robinson getting out of it — you have no idea if that's Tyler Robinson. The fact that he is seen four other times on camera — just a standard white boy with brown hair seen walking upstairs. The DNA on the roof. We should discuss that. And on the screwdriver that he left behind — it's overwhelming, man."

Candace Owens: Yeah, but that's not an exhaustive list.

Andrew Wilson: "Just so we're clear, you did tweet it—"

Candace Owens: But it's not an exhaustive list. Five seconds ago you said—

Andrew Wilson: "That's not what I said."

Candace Owens: It is. You could even pull your own — can you fact check if that was said or not? I did not hear her say—

Andrew Wilson: "You listed on your own Twitter what you found to be convincing: something that looked like his car pulled into the driveway — a blurry image — and a standard white guy coming up the steps that could literally be anyone."

Candace Owens: This never happened for you, though, to say that anybody's a girl boss, right? That's like—

Andrew Wilson: "That came out of your mouth."

Candace Owens: No, that was you. You brought up "girl boss." "Girl boss" came out of your mouth.

Andrew Wilson: "It's a bizarre criticism. Like, nobody's in a bigger girl boss position than you."

Candace Owens: Yeah, I'm actually in—

Andrew Wilson: "The biggest of the girl boss positions. Like, you don't have to do this. You just do this. You could definitely not do it at all and be fine."

Candace Owens: He literally said it. It came out of his mouth. I never said "girl boss." I was just answering and asking him to explain away how he shifted his position — how he suddenly supports Erika being a CEO — and then he started bringing up "girl boss." And he did this so many times it was stunning. People were just going, "Why? Maybe he has amnesia." Maybe it's not a strategy and he has amnesia. But to just assert something with such confidence and to keep lying over and over again was just shocking to me.

We were probably less than an hour into it when I realized he was not okay. I wanted to address this bizarre strategy of public gaslighting. And he again wrongly but ever-confidently filled in the wrong blank when I said, "Are you—" and this actually ended up being one of my favorite moments. Take a listen.

Andrew Wilson: "You didn't mention that I mentioned the screwdriver, DNA, all these other things. You never mentioned any of that. So no, you're actually incorrect there. But on top of that, moving over to the actual evidence itself—"

Candace Owens: Are you okay?

Andrew Wilson: "Yes, I'm okay. Anyway, back to the evidence."

Candace Owens: You're okay. Actually, I'm glad you're asserting that you're okay. I wasn't worried about your health.

I really don't think by that time he was okay. It was already apparent to me that he was kind of coming apart and didn't really have an argument. It was very obvious that he had not watched the preliminary hearing or any hearing for that matter. This is why he could not comprehend the contradiction of him calling people conspiracy theorists — "you're a conspiracy theorist because of the way you're looking at evidence, you're making inferences off of that evidence." That's his whole thing. He couldn't comprehend the hypocrisy of that when in fact he was doing the exact same thing.

All of his evidence — which he felt was overwhelming — was being derived from a hearing wherein the prosecution was doing just that: looking at evidence and interpreting it however they wanted. A blurry image of a white man with brown hair — "I think that's Tyler Robinson." Okay. "I think that's not Tyler Robinson." He calls one a fact and the other a conspiracy theory. This was the whole point of the Utah Rule 1102. And if he had watched how many times they discussed this rule — it was basically, "Yeah, we allow this at this stage, it's probative" — he would have understood why I was pointing out this hypocrisy. But he quite literally could not grasp that concept.

I had to tell him: I can explain it to you, but I cannot understand it for you. We all have our professional limitations. This is one of mine. It's like being in a class and you just have that one student who's not grasping something that seems to the rest of us to be a really easy concept. He's going, "I don't understand. Why do you keep saying it's hearsay? What is 1102? What is this? What does it matter?" Because this grants us all the ability — whether inside or outside of the courtroom — to look at evidence and then to infer upon that evidence. In fact, that's what people are doing in any court case. Both sides are doing that. They're in dispute. One side is saying, "I infer this." One side is saying, "I infer the opposite." Here is the evidence, and the jury makes a decision.

Wilson's "Positive Evidence" Fixation

Anyway, it was very clear to me that because he was weak on the case and didn't know anything, he wanted out of debating the evidence altogether. He didn't want to talk about the degraded print — who says, "So what?" So what? What do you mean, so what? I'm trying to tell you why there is just as much evidence here — the evidence that you say is enough to say that he did it — to say that he was set up as a psyop. I'm trying to prove my claim. But he said, "Nope, let's go to a new phase."

And the next phase was very reminiscent to me of when you learn a new vocab word and you just want to use it. It was like a term he had just learned yesterday or something, and that term was "positive evidence." He just thought that if he kept saying it, people at home would think he was really smart and intellectual. And frankly, it just came across as bizarre. Take a listen to just a little bit of him saying "positive evidence."

Candace Owens: Let's talk about the foreign legion. Was the foreign legion trying to kill you?

Candace Owens: Yes, that's why I reported it to the correct officials in government. That's what I was told, and I handed over that information to Tulsi Gabbard's office.

Andrew Wilson: "What's your best piece of evidence for that?"

Candace Owens: Well, it was—

Andrew Wilson: "Positive evidence."

Candace Owens: This would be at a professional limitation for me to then go and probe that information that I handed over. I can't do that. I'm not the—

Andrew Wilson: "You don't have any positive evidence of that?"

Candace Owens: Can you just stop? It's actually just annoying to hear you keep saying "positive evidence."

Andrew Wilson: "Do you have any positive evidence whatsoever that Israel killed Charlie Kirk?"

Candace Owens: He stopped and ate at Chick-fil-A, which — if you are into LGBTQ issues — wouldn't be your lunch before you go kill Charlie Kirk for LGBTQ issues.

Andrew Wilson: "Yeah. But you have positive evidence and—"

Candace Owens: We cannot say for certainty that Israel called the shots and this is how it happened. But it is definitively, I think, a threat that a lot of us would like to see investigated.

Andrew Wilson: "There's no positive evidence. Don't you think that tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of people would want to know what Candace Owens's positive evidence is for why Israel and France were involved in the most traumatic public assassination of Gen Z's lifetime? She had no positive evidence Israel's involved in anything. No positive evidence that France is involved in anything. No positive evidence TPUSA is involved in anything. No positive evidence that Erika Kirk is involved in anything."

Candace Owens: Genuinely, it was maddening. Could you just stop saying that term? You do not sound smart. You don't need "positive evidence" for your opinions. You just don't. You're like, "Hey, I think chicken sandwiches are better than cheeseburgers." "But what's your positive evidence?" "Well, I just think that—" "What's your positive evidence?"

How would I have to have positive evidence for receiving a threat and taking it to the authorities? Could you imagine if the world worked like that? You receive a threat and someone's like, "Hey, you should know this person is plotting to kill you." And you go to the police station and you're like, "Here's a person who told me this. He's going to kill me." And the police are like, "What's your positive evidence?" My positive evidence is me coming to you with the evidence that I have and expecting you to investigate it, because that's your duty. I mean, that limitation — it was really funny.

I saw a meme of people just being like, "If you think the FBI is involved and you think they planned this assassination, the government's going to help you find the positive evidence for this stuff?" Like, "Well, JFK — I guess it was all above board because you have to have positive evidence, and only the CIA can give you that positive evidence, and they've blacked out the documents, so you just can't speculate about it." I mean, it's just bonkers.

I'm allowed to think what I think about Erika Kirk. I think she's suspicious. And then I flip the script and I say, "Well, what's your positive evidence for you having asserted — as he did before he went to Turning Point USA headquarters in May — he tweeted that he thinks Erika Kirk is too suspicious to have killed her husband?" And so I'm like, "Well, what's your positive evidence for that? Are you allowed to just have opinions?" And then he says he thinks that all women are retards. And sure, if you're sitting across from me — that you're paying $100,000 an hour to speak to — I don't think anyone's walking away thinking that women are dumb in this situation. That's my opinion. I have no positive evidence, but I think most people walked away and thought you were the idiot.

Wilson Attempts to Entrap Owens in a Defamation Claim

Anyway, next, he did what he was obviously sent to do, and you could just see his whole posture changing. He's not feeling confident. He realizes he just said the words "positive evidence" too many times. Nobody cares. No one thinks you're brilliant. And it's quite annoying. And then it moves to this phase where it's very obvious to me that he is trying to entrap me in a lawsuit by getting me to complete sentences in a way that would fall into legal defamation.

He's asking me and surprising me — and this is very Steven Crowder-coded. We told them if you want to send us clips ahead of time, you can, and as you saw, we had no clips planned. We just said we want fact checkers in there because we may arrive at certain points where we dispute what we're saying, and rather than going back and forth — "Yes they did say this" or "Yes she did" — we can just ask them to do a quick fact check. Because there's a lot of information going on in this case and sometimes you just genuinely forget things, as I did genuinely — I didn't accuse him of lying, I said I don't remember the text about the surveillance thing, can we get a fact check on that? And we did. That was the purpose of having fact checkers.

Never did I imagine — because he didn't share who his team was, or I maybe would have considered it — that he was really spending his time while I was prepping for the debate trying to do gotcha clips and come in as Erika Kirk's lawyer. "I'm not with Turning Point USA, but I've got to get you on record defaming Turning Point USA." And he did this in a way that could not have been more obvious. Take a listen.

Andrew Wilson: "Do you have any evidence that Erika Kirk or TPUSA participated in the murder of Charlie Kirk?"

Candace Owens: I've never said they participated in the murder of Charlie Kirk. So how could I say that I have evidence they participated in the murder of Charlie Kirk?

Andrew Wilson: "Okay. So then you don't believe that they did."

Candace Owens: I never have said that statement. So I'm not going to let you get me on record with personal questions about things I've never said.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay. That officer — the first officer that was up on the roof — do you remember his name?"

Candace Owens: Officer Bagley.

Andrew Wilson: "Yeah. What was his first name?"

Candace Owens: Christopher. When Christopher got up on the roof, you talk a lot about how his camera died.

Andrew Wilson: "His camera died. Yeah."

Candace Owens: Do you think that he planted that screwdriver up there?

Andrew Wilson: "No."

Candace Owens: No. Who do you think planted it?

Andrew Wilson: "I — if we're just going on my — am I allowed to have an opinion? Of course. At this stage, I would say that I don't buy his assertion on the stand that he didn't check to see if anybody went onto the rooftop before he got up there. I do think that it's possible — it's at least plausible — that the screwdriver was planted. I don't believe him. What I can say strongly is that his body cam died at just the right time. His body cam died at just the right time. I think that — as you were just grilling me about whether or not I had the merchant receipt for a debit card — that kind of makes it difficult that we just have to sort of trust that a screwdriver was found and we don't have any body cam evidence. That right there is why it is impossible for me to think that Erika Kirk is not complicit somehow. Because—"

Candace Owens: Those two thoughts actually don't even follow. How would it be the case that even if Erika Kirk did believe that Tyler Robinson was 100% responsible for the death of Charlie Kirk — let's just say she believed it with every fiber of her being, believed all the evidence — would it then follow that somehow she's complicit in his death?

Andrew Wilson: "I didn't say complicit in death. You added those two words."

Candace Owens: Okay. So what's she complicit in?

Yes. Look at his face. You could just see the dishonesty there. That sentence was so planned. "Complicit in his death." That's not what we were discussing. We were talking about the fact that Erika — I'll forgive him — implies that Tyler Robinson is guilty. Tyler Robinson is up for the death sentence. And when you are someone who is going around signaling to the public that this person did it, and we assume that you have more evidence, you've seen something — which was the broad assumption as I explained — and it comes to find out that you had nothing different than what the public had, people are going to go, "This feels wrong. This feels like wrongdoing." You're potentially getting what could be a jury to believe that this is the person who committed murder, and the consequence he will face is death.

I could just see that move from a mile away. That was so Daily Wire-coded, I would say. They love lawsuits, they love legal entrapments. That's what that felt like to me. And I could sense that he was growing frustrated that I would not take the bait. I'm smarter than that.

And then I called him out for having played three Erika Kirk clips in a row. You're sitting here saying you're not here on behalf of Turning Point USA, but you start with an opening text that only Turning Point USA could have given you — that they have not given to the public — and now you're playing three clips in defense of her.

That then led to the internet's most awkward silence, where he just says that I'm not allowed to speak. And by the way, because he lies with confidence, people who were watching this thought there must have been something contractually that prevented me from speaking or allowed him to pepper questions at me. Both are false. There is absolutely no contract clause that allowed him to sit me for a deposition — I refused it immediately. And there was no contract clause that suggested I couldn't ask him questions at any point in our discussion. Not even kind of, sort of. He was just genuinely coming apart and growing really antsy. And he lies with so much confidence that the internet just assumed there must be something. No. Here's that painful, painful internet silence.

Candace Owens: Can I ask a question? Or like, can I ask a question?

Andrew Wilson: "Not really. We're going to hold to the actual contract itself."

Candace Owens: The contract does not say that you are allowed to just question me without me being able to respond to you or have a conversation.

Andrew Wilson: "I've never said you can't respond to every question I've asked you. And by the way—"

Candace Owens: Let's have it your way. I want it to look like we've done everything Andrew wanted to, so that people can fairly assess the situation. So you have it your way. I will not ask a question.

Andrew Wilson: "Totally fair with me."

Candace Owens: So are you going to ask the question or no? He said no. Waiting for the clip.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay. So you want to wait for the clip first."

Candace Owens: Okay.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay. Beautiful. You need the — Jeopardy — the team told me they had it."

Candace Owens: So that's what I heard.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay, there we go. Come on, guys."

Candace Owens: It was so painful. What I think happened was — because I called him out, I said, "You have four Erika Kirk clips," and he was like, "It wasn't four," and PBD said, "It was three" — I think what happened was they had another Erika Kirk clip in the queue and then they just abandoned it. They were like, "We can't run this." And so then they ran this totally irrelevant clip that was supposed to be a bombshell but I had naturally corrected myself very early on in our discussion. I didn't realize he was plotting this as some big explosion — "Candace got it wrong, they never officially said that Lance's DNA was on the rifle." They kind of played that and it was weird, and I allowed it.

I totally allowed the silence because you should never get in the way of your opponent when they're making a mistake. It was such a completely nutty thing to say and to do — "No, I'm just going to wait for the clip. You can't say anything." And it was a lie. And I thought, let him do this, because it's just going to demonstrate his emotional instability, that he is trying to assert control because he knows he's lost it. Also, I was not going to argue with him about a non-existent contract clause and waste energy. And lastly, if you consider it, I made $41,863 during that 16-second silence. What is there to complain about? You want me to be quiet? Okay, I got you. I'll be silent. That's a lot of money to make to be quiet.

The Most Viral Moment: Wilson Doesn't Know the Charges

Then came the most viral moment, and it happened accidentally. I felt bad that viewers had to listen through him sing for Erika for so long. We had agreed to discuss this case. I had said to him, "We should discuss the screwdriver. We should discuss the towel." And I tried to change the topic back to the case. And I made the wrong assumption that Andrew Wilson had read the last filing — the filing for dismissal — which dropped two days before our debate. My positive evidence for that assumption was that Andrew Wilson himself had tweeted about the filing as though it was helpful to his case. He tweeted about the filing and they were all lying about what the filing was. He retweeted somebody else who said, "Skimmed it. The Tyler Robinson defense is on absolute life support." And then he wrote back, "Picked a hell of a week." So I was like, obviously he must have read this filing.

And I read through the filing, marked it up, took notes — as I do with everything, for those of you who've been following me since the Blake thing — and thought there were some really compelling arguments here. So I came prepared that we were going to discuss the most recent filing. I also just sort of thought that even if he didn't read the book, he would have at least read the last chapter before taking the exam. Every person knows that if you're going to try to BS and pretend that you read the book, you better read the last chapter in case a character dies before you try to write an essay. And I was wrong.

I was floored when I saw him again do that obvious tell of his false bravado. He just lies. The manner that this man lies should be taught in a psych course. I've never seen anything like it. When I asked him which charge specifically he thought Tyler Robinson was guilty of, it was because I wanted to make sure I didn't make an assumption that he was more flexible in other areas. As we dove into this recent filing and he did the false "of course, bring it up," I went, "Oh, he doesn't know any of them." And so this obviously became the most discussed moment. This man came in to debate Tyler Robinson's guilt and did not know guilty of what. Take a listen.

Candace Owens: Which one of the charges — or all of them — do you think Tyler Robinson is guilty of?

Andrew Wilson: "The specific charge. Yeah. So I think what I think is that Tyler Robinson shot Charlie Kirk."

Candace Owens: Yeah. But of the seven charges that he's being charged with—

Andrew Wilson: "Yeah. Can we list them real quick? I'll tell you exactly which ones. We'll pull them up."

Candace Owens: Well, do you know any of the charges he's up for right now?

Andrew Wilson: "Yeah, of course. But I want to make sure that we have them listed."

Candace Owens: Yeah. But can you name one? Because my general perspective is that you don't actually care about this case. You're not following it. It seems pretty — like, if you're going to engage and you're going to say the evidence is overwhelming that Tyler Robinson is guilty, I just think you should — can you tell me one?

Andrew Wilson: "Let's do the counter. You can really hang out. This is a great—"

Candace Owens: No, no. You just got to ask me — you play clips out of context, put me in the hot seat. So please just answer the question.

Andrew Wilson: "Fair. Name all seven since you've been following the case."

Candace Owens: Okay, sure. You name one.

Andrew Wilson: "Yeah, you name all seven."

Candace Owens: I'm happy to do that, but can you name one?

Andrew Wilson: "I think he's been charged with murder."

Candace Owens: That's actually incorrect.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay, great. Now name all seven."

Candace Owens: He doesn't even — name all seven.

Andrew Wilson: "I can't."

Candace Owens: Then do it. Sure. You don't have to put—

Andrew Wilson: "No, do it. I'll count them. Go ahead."

Candace Owens: You don't have to put your fingers up. Okay, hang on. Name them.

Andrew Wilson: "Yeah, sure. The first charge is aggravated murder, because that's what carries the death sentence in the state of—"

Candace Owens: No, that is literally not murder.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay."

Candace Owens: And so just — people — don't — I don't have to do it in a time limit. There's nothing going on. And just to explain to people the difference of why that really matters and shows that he doesn't actually care about this at all: aggravated murder is narrowly defined and it carries a death sentence. I'm going to answer the question. You're just going to recognize that your strategy of thinking that people are intimidated when you try to put a time constraint doesn't work, and you'll be better the next time you debate.

Andrew Wilson: "I got it. Give me the other ones."

Candace Owens: If the more you cut me off, the longer I'll take. Do you want to just wait for me to finish explaining why that's a big difference?

Andrew Wilson: "I want you to list the charges."

Candace Owens: Yeah, I'm going to do that. You just don't get to pretend there's a time constraint for me to do that.

Andrew Wilson: "Well, how long does it take you to list seven charges?"

Candace Owens: I'm speaking. You just got to—

Andrew Wilson: "It sounds like you're just delaying it because you don't know them."

Candace Owens: I know all seven of them. And I'm going to say again — because you're going to get embarrassed — you don't have to rush this. I'm also showing an example of a very flawed debate strategy. I actually am under no time constraint.

Andrew Wilson: "I got one."

Candace Owens: Great. The second charge is the felony discharge of a weapon. The next two charges are for obstruction of justice. The next two charges are for witness tampering. And the final—

Andrew Wilson: "What's the specific charges though?"

Candace Owens: That is them. Obstruction of justice. Obstruction of justice. Witness tampering. Witness tampering.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay. And there's no other specifics to them."

Candace Owens: Well, I can tell you why he's being—

Andrew Wilson: "No, no. Just the charges and then seven."

Candace Owens: Yeah. See, the bad thing is when you try to be an a-hole and it doesn't work.

Andrew Wilson: "What's the seventh?"

Candace Owens: The last charge is violence in front of a minor.

Andrew Wilson: "Okay. Got it. So then he's being charged with murder."

Candace Owens: Shaken. I mean, like, it's just — I can't even imagine what it must be like. Why say "of course"? Why not just say, "I actually don't know the specific charges"? Which would have been crazy, but then he just — it's this false bravado. This is how he debates. He just lies confidently. And then when you recognize it and call him out, he falls apart and he starts sinking more and more into the chair, sweating, developed some things in his teeth. And I just — that entire personality of a man just could never work with me. I would never for a single second be intimidated by that, because it's false bravado. There's nothing here that's remotely intimidating. You're just an idiot dressed up as some blood-sport debate bro.

There's nothing weaker than not just saying, "Oh, I don't know that. I would like to know what the answer to that is." I was hoping we would actually be able to have that constructive dialogue. I was upset that we could not spend more time discussing this case. And once that happened, he was completely deflated. Andrew Wilson was very lost. It was almost like he had to remember things they wanted him to bring up. It was very obvious that his foot just wanted out. I think his foot wanted to tell the truth. The foot was just — it wanted out. They were like, "Oh, the foot holds the truth." He was literally shaking in his boots. I don't know what was going on there.

The Steakhouse Receipt and the Timeline Dispute

He couldn't regain any sort of composure. I didn't understand anything he was getting at beyond that. He started this bizarre inquisition about my show's timeline, demanding to know why it was my show's official timeline and why I had included Tyler Robinson and Panguitch eating a steak. I don't know if he's just averse to organization. I love organizing. Timelines make sense to me. I love highlighting them. I love putting timestamps. I'm very proud of that. I don't know what he was getting at. He just wanted to know. I'm like, I spoke to the owner. The owner told me that he pulled the receipt, that it was Tyler Robinson's receipt. I included this on my timeline, and then the receipt that was shared was the real receipt. And then he's like, "Well, why didn't you ask the merchant?" Take a listen to what he said. It was so absurd.

Andrew Wilson: "Well, the reason I'm asking you is because you always include it in your timeline that he traveled to the steakhouse."

Candace Owens: Yeah, we've been building a timeline with things that we feel are—

Andrew Wilson: "But is there any actual—"

Candace Owens: You saw Rule 1102 approved. I think speaking to the owner, knowing that there's a receipt, seeing the receipt, is good enough to put on our timeline.

Andrew Wilson: "But the receipt itself — the question I always had about it is, couldn't you just call the merchant? Like if I've ever had a merchant account, I just call the merchant account processor and say, 'What's the name on this?'"

Candace Owens: I would stay tuned. I feel that having spoken to the owner, the evidence is compelling enough to put onto my personal timeline of what took place on that day. That's where it's going to stay. And if it gets debunked, I'm happy to take it off. That's how an investigation works.

Andrew Wilson: "But the question is, the receipt itself has not been verified to have been Tyler's."

Candace Owens: I just want to say you're holding me to a higher standard than you are.

Andrew Wilson: "I'm not even — I'm asking specifically."

Candace Owens: I've been very forthcoming. I told exactly what happened. I spoke to the owner. I got the tip and I—

Andrew Wilson: "So should that be added in an official timeline that you—"

Candace Owens: It's in my timeline. It's my show and we can add and subtract what we want, and we do.

Andrew Wilson: "Sure. But I'm asking, should you include a thing that you know hasn't actually been verified to be Tyler Robinson?"

Candace Owens: Yes, you should. If we're trying to build a timeline, you should. Yeah.

Andrew Wilson: "You don't think that that falls under—"

Candace Owens: You should remove it if someone somehow debunks it. But I think there is very strong evidence that that is where he was.

Andrew Wilson: "What's the strong evidence? Just the two people who said that they saw him."

Candace Owens: I feel like I've sufficiently answered your question about how I got the information, what happened next. Would the next stage of this investigation be somebody accessing his debit card and confirming it? Yes. And I do believe that that will happen. If it does not happen and it gets debunked, I'll remove it from my personal timeline.

He's like the first-person account of the server saying that he served him — they contacted the FBI, he shared his experience, he recognized Tyler Robinson on the news, he gave an interview. The owner — I spoke to him. And he's like, "None of that is positive evidence." I'm legitimately held to a higher standard than the FBI. Meanwhile, we got the lead investigator of the case up there, and they're asking him during the preliminary hearing, "How did you know that the maroon person walking up the stairs was the same person as the individual wearing the black shirt later that day?" And he says, "They were both wearing Converse sneakers." Andrew says that's compelling. Tweets that that's part of the overwhelming evidence. Okay. Did you call Visa and Mastercard? Did you call to confirm with the merchant that this was in fact Tyler Robinson? No. Actually, I haven't done that.

But you know what? My timeline's going to stay my timeline. I'm proud of my timeline. I'm a very organized person. My pantry is very clean. I love the Container Store. I use label makers for everything — even my seasonings in my cabinet. I have label makers in my refrigerator. So I will not allow you to tell me how my timeline should be organized. I almost lost it there. Suburban moms who have organized pantries, stand up.

Post-Debate Reaction: Memes, Coping, and Polymarket

At the end of the day, I am so embarrassed for Turning Point USA. I cannot imagine Erika hugging this person. They thought this guy was going to be able to take me down. I was trained by Charlie Kirk and they sent me Andrew Wilson.

But I will say on a positive note, it was bittersweet, because it was just amazing to remember all of those things that Charlie told me not to do, not to fall for. Don't start attacking him personally — I did not engage in that. He opened with ad hominem attacks against me. Remembering to always overstudy — I took it very seriously. I was not playing gotcha clips. I was marking up filings, reminding myself, re-watching the preliminary hearing, going back to the timeline to remind myself, because so much has transpired in 11 months. And Charlie used to always tell me that you see people get crushed in these sorts of debates who are overconfident, and then there's just the one kid who asks a question that throws them off and it goes viral. So never underestimate your opponent.

I didn't know what to expect. I didn't obviously expect that he was just going to be one of these weird middle-aged men with gotcha clips. I thought he was genuinely going to read at least one of the case filings or know what the charges are. But like I said, it was good to go through that again. I did every single thing Charlie told me to do — stay calm when they're trying to poke you, be aware of people trying to put you into legal traps. And when it concluded, we were just cheering. We were so happy. Bittersweet, obviously, because I never thought in any of that learning with Charlie that it would one day be me debating someone his organization clearly sent. But such is life, and I'm happy that it is me who is exposing what his organization has become in the wake of his assassination.

Okay, so much that I want to say about the reaction on the internet. It was fantastic. First and foremost, I don't think the left and right have ever been united on anything, but in our general sense of what Turning Point USA has become, we're united. Genuinely, he performed so badly. Not even the neocons would touch it. The best they could do for Andrew Wilson was to say it was unwatchable. And everyone who was backing him just sort of backed off immediately. The memes have been exceptional from the left and from the right. They have been exceptional, mocking him.

This man is not a conservative, by the way. I'm so sick of these wannabe elitist people who come out and call themselves conservatives but obviously live their lives in a way that is anything but. They're complete frauds.

I'm going to go through some of my favorite memes. Andrew first came out declaring that he won by asking — not ChatGPT — he asked Claude, and Claude told him he won, since every poll said he didn't win with humans. He then went to Claude and drummed up a conversation, and Claude told him he really was the winner. Everyone who's a human didn't like you, but the robot community loves you. He actually tweeted this: "Every AI source will say I won. This was never in question." He actually ended up getting a fact check on this, and people explained that AI is just scraping from establishment sources, and we all know the establishment is behind Turning Point USA.

He literally crashed markets during the debate, by the way. I didn't know that Polymarket had odds on whether or not Tyler Robinson would be convicted. And during the debate, the odds crashed. That represents our debate day — you see that line going down. That is how poorly he performed. "Tyler Robinson victim of homicide" dropped into the 30s. I think it hit 34% during our debate, which was positively hilarious.

I'm going to show you some of my favorite memes. You might have seen on the thumbnail — if you are not following this account, I think it's @whereforbidden on X — they are so funny. For years I've been following them. They are so funny. But this AI video which went viral this weekend, represented on my thumbnail, just tickled me so much — of Erika calling in Andrew after that abysmal performance. Take a listen and a watch.

Erika (AI): "Wait, wait. I can explain."

"Shabbat shalom, Andrew."

Andrew (AI): "What?"

Erika (AI): "We invested a lot in you."

Andrew (AI): "I was having nicotine withdrawal. The chair was uncomfortable. I barely slept. My foot was—"

Erika (AI): "Silence. She asked you to name one of the seven charges. You said 'positive evidence' 47 times."

Andrew (AI): "It was a framework."

Erika (AI): "47 times, Andrew. Bring me the jar."

Andrew (AI): "No. Please. Not the pickles."

Erika (AI): "Jars Wide Shut."

Candace Owens: And just to correct that, the handle is @whereforbidden on X. The reason why it's "Jars Wide Shut" is because this goes back to a moment where he was being disrespectful to a woman who couldn't open a jar — I think it was actually of olives or pickles — on whatever podcast. And he was smoking a cigarette, and she said, "Okay, then you open it." And he couldn't open it. So now he's kind of called Pickle Boy. And again, his false bravado all the time is what gets him into these circumstances. I absolutely loved that.

I also loved the "stages of grief." Everybody grieves differently. So he's grieving by first talking to Claude. The five stages of debate grief — this is from @alphaapproved. They write: "Denial: I totally won that debate. Number two, anger: That was rigged. Biased. Unfair." That's actually going to happen — his wife. "Number three, bargaining: Okay, maybe I lost, but Candace is worse. Number four, depression: Why do I even debate? Number five, acceptance," which will come — he will come out and say, "All right, maybe I should have prepared. Maybe I should have known one of the charges." We are at phase one and we are also at phase two, which I can give you an example of — his wife trying to suggest that we maybe rigged the mic pieces.

Okay, I have one in my ear right now. It allows us to hear what the producers are saying. His guy Rob — who was very professional and kind, so no shade to Rob — was sitting next to them, and that's why he was saying, "Could you pull a clip?" or whatever. His team was right next to my team, and these earpieces do not work beyond 15 feet out of the control room. So there's no one else that could possibly be talking in your ear because of the structure of our walls.

Anyway, Rachel responds — who's his wife — responds to somebody trying to pretend that I was receiving intel on that last question because they're still coping over this. "Was Candace Owens being fed answers? Something about the debate caught my attention. Both Candace and Andrew appeared to be wearing in-ear monitors, so what are these actually used for?" I literally turned these people into conspiracy theorists by the end of it. He started off by calling us conspiracy theorists, and then by the end of it he was going through my phone and thought I was texting people for answers. That's amazing. That's a flawless victory.

What I was actually doing when he came back — I barely got up. I literally only got up one time that entire debate. He went up every break. I did not get up. I was tweeting. You guys saw me tweet right before that. I sent one tweet. I texted nobody during the entire debate because I was focused. I was locked in. But then I was like, "I'm going to send a funny tweet because I feel pretty confident I won this." And when he came back, he saw me doing that and thought I had texted someone. Which is very funny. And guess what? The answer to a conspiracy theory — I demonstrated for him. Here's my phone. Just answer the question. Make the person feel comfortable. You don't have to go crazy. And it's the one thing Turning Point USA does not want to do at all — answer any questions.

We also created our own meme because I used to be anti-Turning Point USA shills. But he's different. I don't want anybody referring to Andrew Wilson as a paid shill. Andrew Wilson's not a paid shill. This is like the Drake meme. "TPUSA sending paid shills — not cool. TPUSA sending shills that pay — we're with it. We're with it. Send more." That's how you'll show them. Pay $100,000 an hour to be embarrassed. Genius. What a great idea. That's amazing. That's my new rate: $100,000 if you want me to embarrass you.

Anyway, his wife had responded to that and tried to add to it, like, "I know that they had headpieces, but I'm not really sure why they had these headpieces. I believe the contract stipulated that each of them was allowed to wear an earpiece." That's just a lie. Why do they lie so much? Why do they lie all the time? No, the earpieces — which he and I were sharing left and right — were just our producers. We all heard the exact same thing, and PBD had a direct line to them.

Then this cope was hilarious because obviously Steven Crowder is somehow invested in this, and just never growing up. When he did — I guess he was on the phone with Andrew Wilson right after the debate — he kind of tried to imply that one way we tried to hurt him was by not providing him with hair and makeup because he looked like he was sweating. Take a listen to this absurd exchange.

Steven Crowder: "Did they Nixon-JFK you? Because she has a full stylist and makeup crew. Did they give you makeup? No, no, no. You looked a little bit — you looked a little shiny."

Andrew Wilson: "I would have refused."

Steven Crowder: "You looked a little shiny."

Candace Owens: I don't even know what to say. First and foremost — asserting something confidently and lying — we do not have, nor have we ever had, wardrobe. We do not have a full-time makeup artist. We do not have a full-time hair stylist. None of that. In between takes, I take care of myself. That's it. Everybody knows that my cousin does my hair. She's the one that gives me the blowouts and takes care of my hair. People have known this for years, since before I was even a podcaster. She has been taking care of my hair. And our makeup artist was actually off that day. She does a glam-and-go — in the morning she comes in and then she leaves.

This is how much these people were coping — trying to find a conspiracy to make it seem like there was something unfair. If you look greasy, pull up a mirror instead of going out and having a cigarette and a smoke, and powder your own face. I don't know what to tell you. We're a small team and we just don't care about things like that. We don't want to spend a bunch of money on things to make ourselves feel important.

And my favorite of the copes was his wife conceding exactly what us conspiracy theorists have been saying since the very beginning — that actually the grifters are these people. They know nothing about the case at all. They just want to go on TV and say, "Oh, this person's scared of me. This person won't debate." They don't know anything. So she writes this long tweet, and it's right there in yellow. She says, "Of course, Candace will know the details better. She's been covering this day in and day out for 11 months and doing practically nothing else. Andrew had about six days to prepare. There's no way he was going to beat her on having more knowledge of the details."

Goodness, Rachel. Wow. This is a wife that — so she admits I beat him on that, which stands against his "I won the debate," but also she admits he doesn't care about this. He walked into Turning Point USA headquarters in June and came out flashing around money and suddenly tweeting at me and attacking me, because that's what they orchestrate at Turning Point USA headquarters. This is no longer a serious organization that cares about whether or not people are living their lives admirably.

It is crazy to me that if you just go through the clips and learn about Andrew and Rachel Wilson, this is who they tied their horse to. This is who they're feeding information to. That any person would willfully donate to them. That any person would want their child to sign up for this conservative organization that is not representing conservative principles. My opinion, by the way — where's my positive evidence for it? Andrew Wilson. Is that positive evidence? I don't know. Can it be my opinion that Turning Point USA is a dumpster fire? Because that's what it is.

The $300,000 Winnings and What Owens Plans to Do With Them

I do want to address this very quickly. People were randomly — as soon as I said I would take it — first it's "she's scared, she's scared, she's scared." There's money on the table and that's what I'm doing wrong. I'm being scared and not taking the money. Then I take the money — exactly what he offers, $300,000 — and I'm a bad guy because how could I take the money? These people are insane. They're just insane. There's no way to make them happy. They can't leave you alone and let you just investigate the case.

And they were all instantly like, "Candace needs to establish a trust for Erika Kirk." The people outside of Michael Knowles — the people that I absolutely despise — all saying this in unison, that I need to donate this money and establish a trust for Charlie's children. And then people just randomly tell me what I should do with the money. Like, for example, this person: "Multi-millionaire Candace Owens should donate her victory money to Tyler Robinson's defense if she really thinks that he's innocent. Andrew Wilson put his money where his mouth is. Why doesn't Candace?"

Like, I didn't publicly offer Tyler Robinson — go across things and say, "I'm going to prove to people that I think he's innocent, I'm going to give." I never did that. I don't do those sorts of things. That's not what I do. I'm not braggadocious. Nor would any person who knows the least bit about finance be so stupid as to spend $300,000 to have a conversation with someone who debates for free. I always do my annual debates with Piers Morgan — they're for free. I've been debating all across college campuses — I was doing that for free. I've had debates with Rabbi Shmuley, who I can't stand, on Piers Morgan — for free. And so it's just so interesting that actually my entire life, all these people ever do is message me kindly and respectfully and ask for a debate. No one has to throw money around. That's how it works. I've hosted debates. There's been no money involved.

This is unique because Turning Point USA just hates me this much, and Blake Neff and Andrew Kolvet were obviously retweeting him as he was going after me and offering more and more money. And now they think the solution to that is for me to open a trust for Charlie's children, which in a way — I know it's not — but it feels like money laundering. The organization that's hunting me — you want me to then give the money to the person who would be in control of that, which at first of course would be Erika.

First and foremost, what I want to say is there are a few things I despise more than fake altruism. People who do charity as part of a PR program and not because it's necessary or needed. And Charlie Kirk's children have been multi-millionaires while he was alive. That increased in his death. Many people opened trusts, raised money. The last thing that Charlie Kirk's children need is more money. What they need is a stable parent. And unfortunately, I can't give them that. Mom doesn't want to be home. Dad can't be home. And the one thing they need is not a bunch of influencers using them as a talking point and suggesting that $300,000 more could plausibly make a difference.

And like I said, there's something about it that just feels icky. The very people who sent the person to hunt you are basically trying to create a peer pressure campaign for you to give the money back. That's not going to stand for me.

And so instead, what I would like to announce that I'm doing with my money thus far — other than the fact that I did go to Waffle House this weekend — is I'm going to take care of the people who took care of me. As this organization has fixated, sent influencers as part and parcel of these group chats that are coming together to protect Erika Kirk — people who have attempted to make our children feel unsafe, that they have gotten behind, retweeted, supported — I'm going to look out for those people. People like my sister.

If you want an organization that's going to get money from me, it's going to be the Catholic Church — the priests that took care of me emotionally when I was coming apart with the realization that Charlie and everything that he had worked for was being betrayed. He has been betrayed. Everybody can see that. You betray him every single day when you do these sorts of things. You betray who he was. You betray the friendships that he had. You lie constantly about who he was, about the things that he was thinking.

I am not going to take any instruction from Turning Point USA or any of their affiliates or any of these neocon dogs that they send out on what I should do with money. It's just not going to happen. So yeah, I'm going to take care of my sisters. I'm going to give money to the Catholic Church, and then I'm going to decide what I want to do. That's it. You were the ones who offered the money. You were the ones who retweeted it. And so it's therefore mine. You can skip all of your fake altruism.

Why don't you guys give more money to that organization? Because the direction that they're headed, I don't see this being an organization in 10 years down the road. I see it crashing and burning like everybody else does. And like I said, for the first time ever, the left and the right are united in their disgust for what this organization has become. And that was not a feeling that people had on the right, especially in the wake of the assassination. So you guys did this. This was your loss, your L. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

Audience Comments and Closing Thoughts

Okay. I also want to let you guys know — we got so many messages: "Please sell the t-shirt. I can explain to you, but I cannot understand it for you." We do have that available on our website. We also made that a sweatshirt. And of course a mug. We also put up this — this is my second favorite shirt. If you know, you know. It's in maroon. If you've learned nothing from this podcast: to do bad stuff, you wear your second favorite shirt, not your first favorite shirt. So we have some merch available on the website.

And that is of course the easiest way to support us and support the work that we do and the investigation, which we can now refocus on — which was really none of their business at all. Why Turning Point USA doesn't want people investigating and exploring other leads in the Charlie Kirk assassination boggles the mind. It really boggles the mind.

Top comments from the great debate. Go Max Everyday writes: "Let me begin by reading this message from my sponsor, Turning Point USA." Yes, that is what it felt like. It was absurd. It had nothing to do with the debate claims.

Second message: "75 to 85% confident Tyler did it is literally reasonable doubt." I am so glad I didn't even look at the comments. My producers pulled this. You guys clocked it as well. It's crazy that they just concede the entire debate right at the beginning. So yes, you have a right to pursue other leads. No, you do not have to reach out to Visa and Mastercard and speak to the merchant to do so.

Comments from today's episode. True Detective writes: "Andrew Wilson's rules for the debate: avoid knowing the facts of the case, pretend to be intelligent and qualified, and don't mind that your left foot is nodding in agreement with Candace throughout the conversation. And question: when Andrew's wife makes him a sandwich, is he expected to open the pickle jar?" I mean, that relationship is just odd at best, toxic. You should go look up clips of that — her disgusting mouth and the things that she says on the Whatever podcast and how she speaks. And they're branding themselves as Orthodox Christians. And he said on some stream that his wife went in and spoke to the executives at Turning Point USA.

That's why I say Turning Point USA is just over. This Christian cosplay has to end. We just have to stop pretending. Erika, on her face, can't get a sentence out without saying "the Lord, the Lord, the Lord." She's hugging Andrew Wilson. These are who is being brought into our organization and given money to train people to debate. I'm sorry, people are clocking that. It's not positive evidence, but it feels like some evidence that the whole brand is fraudulent now. It feels like evidence that Turning Point USA is now essentially trying to sell people faux Christianity while they behave in just the most detestable way behind the scenes. And now it's in front of the scenes.

Like I said, I can't wait for him to drop that message. They have themselves in a pickle with that message. He says he's dropping it this week. Do your thing, Andrew. Do your thing.

We Woke Now writes: "In the words of my grandmother, 'He don't know no better.' Way to stay above the muck." Yes, I was just not going to meet him on his level. He came across as petty. And these men are too old for this. He's almost 50. Steven Crowder's 40. Grow up. Be professional. What are you all doing with these accounts dedicated to tweeting about Candace Owens 90 times a day? Find something that gives you purpose and go after it. I don't know these people. I literally have never met Steven Crowder. So that entire obsession with me is just because I covered when he was bullying his wife and said it was gross. Because it was.

Chris Angelo writes: "One thing that is actually overwhelming is how proud Charlie is of you as he smiles from heaven. The Holy Spirit truly gave you the patience and discernment needed for the debate. Keep going for the truth and for Charlie. Christ." Thank you for saying that. And like I said, that was the bittersweet thing — I really feel like I have this, Charlie. No, you should still go over everything, because it just takes one question to throw you off your game. You have to stay updated. And I did all of that. And I'm glad that it worked out.

Jenna wrote: "You were amazing in the debate. I offered my daily mass and rosary for you on Friday. I am so proud of you. Such a role model for my four daughters. Christ is King." Yeah, that's one of the first things I did. I went to Saturday mass and just thanked the Lord for the ability to communicate in a way and to have the opportunity to expose what we all know is going on. And that's by the way the real purpose of what Andrew was doing — to distract us with nothingness. They brought no new people to their side. It's just the same establishment media trying to convince you that you should not believe your own eyes and ears. And that's what we're living right now.

Riley England writes: "Candace, what a masterclass for how gracefully and brilliantly you defend your convictions with facts. We all know you did this for Charlie. You displayed a restraint and a class that I look up to, and you clearly owned Pickles. St. Jonah, pray for us." Indeed, that is my patron saint. And I hope that people did learn that you just stay calm. I know people can see through that. They saw right through him in the same way that I saw through him live. Maddening to hear him keep telling us stuff happened five seconds ago that didn't happen five seconds ago, but say it with smugness and arrogance.

Zamit writes: "I think Andrew Wilson was hoping to open the pickle jar with the screwdriver that they planted on the rooftop." Indeed.

Cowins writes: "Thank you, Candace. Followed you since Fox News. You're no more on Fox. Thank God for you. And Charlie, with love." Thank you.

And Jay Beam writes: "It really freaks me out that Andrew said, 'You could just not do what you are doing — seeking the truth and asking questions — and be okay.' He said that quote: 'You could just not do what you're doing and be okay.' It's almost as if he is aware or realized on air that you are close to the truth. Totally creepy for him to say that. A bit worried."

It was strange to me that he so instantly jumped into the Israel and France narrative. And people would add that to why they think Israel is suspicious — because why does it take and require so many people to try to tell us that Israel is not involved? Why is that a priority for you at all? Your debate claim is that the evidence is overwhelming that Tyler Robinson did it. If the evidence is truly overwhelming that Tyler Robinson did it, you defending and proving your debate claim would take care of the Israel one. But he doesn't want to do that. He doesn't want to talk about or defend the claim.

And I want to go: why do you think Israel did it? Where is your positive evidence? My positive evidence is you sitting here right now prioritizing defending Israel rather than your claim. It's suspicious. People think it's suspicious because it is. You keep trying to force this "Israel didn't do it" narrative, and the more you do it, we go — it just doesn't make sense. The best way to prove Israel's innocence is to prove Tyler Robinson's guilt. And you failed to do that. People should be taking a look at the Israel narrative. We have a right to ask questions. We're going to continue to do that.

Seven Sheets wrote: "'I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you.' Wow. We need merch. This will go down in debate history. Kudos to your bravery once again, but they must realize we are Legion right behind you. God is with you." Thank you so much for you guys being with me. I think our audience actually grew. The platform got bigger. And it's because of telling the truth. Also, exercising humility is really important. And if you learn anything from this debate — if you don't know something, just say you don't know it. You're not required to be an expert at everything.

I didn't even dive into it — it sounded crazy when he said the bullet split in air and caused air under your shirt. It felt like another one of his confident lies, but I wasn't going to pretend to be a ballistics expert on splitting bullets midair, and I just trusted the internet. They will take a look at that. The hunters, the common-sense people — we're going to go, "This man is once again lying boldly about that claim." And sure enough, we've already seen videos of people just going, "He's clinically insane." I had Air Force veterans messaging me being like, "I cannot believe he said this on your platform." And that's the point. This is how we grow. This is how we are Legion. Because people go, "That is such an absurd lie to tell that I now need to look into what Candace has been saying." And so many people then go back and watch the content and recognize the holes.

And we are doing this because we know everything is wrong with the Charlie Kirk narrative. Literally everything is wrong with this narrative. And like I say to you guys all the time, they're not going to get away with it. Positive evidence or not, I sense that we are getting closer to the truth and they are getting panicked.

Preview: More Truth Coming for Turning Point USA

But here's what I will say. There has to be a consequence for Turning Point USA. There does. Vengeance does not belong to me, but the truth belongs to everybody. And there's nothing I do better than sentencing them to more truth. So get excited, because tomorrow we will be sentencing Turning Point USA to more truth — which is what they want, more truth and transparency, right? You send an absolute slob to my home to debate me, to disrespect me by not being honest and forthright about who he wanted to bring here, to violate our rules of no filming where my children play — we drop more truth. That's it. That's all.