Candace Owens examines the Mikey McCoy witness statement, TPUSA influencer misconduct, and Macklemore's removal from Ed Sheeran's tour
Candace Owens hosts a solo episode of her podcast covering three main topics: suspicious details surrounding who took Mikey McCoy's witness statement on the day of Charlie Kirk's assassination, the sexual assault conviction of a Turning Point USA-affiliated influencer, and Macklemore's removal from Ed Sheeran's tour after making a pro-Palestinian statement.
Summary
Presenting footage showing that Mikey McCoy's witness statement on September 10th — the day of Charlie Kirk's assassination — was taken by an officer wearing an ICAC (Internet Crimes Against Children) vest, approximately 25 minutes after the event. She argues this is part of a broader pattern in which virtually every official involved in the Charlie Kirk case has a career background in child sex crimes investigation, which she characterizes as an intentional federal control mechanism connected to what she believes is a re-emerged Epstein network.
She also covers the history of David O. Levit, who served as Utah's state Attorney General until around 2022, noting a 2020 federal whistleblower case alleging potential trafficking violations and a 2022 investigation in which he was named in a 151-page victim statement alleging ritual child sexual abuse and cannibalism — allegations he denied as politically motivated.
She reveals that Matt Tardio, a former Army Ranger brought onto the Charlie Kirk Show to debunk her footage analysis, pleaded no contest in October 2025 in Portland to felony coercion and misdemeanor harassment after allegedly grabbing a woman at a protest and carrying her down an alley — an incident captured on surveillance cameras at an ICE facility.
Finally, she covers Macklemore's removal from Ed Sheeran's tour following a pro-Palestinian speech, noting that billionaire Robert Kraft lobbied for his removal. Owens argues the speech contained nothing anti-Semitic and that the removal is an example of the Israel lobby silencing artists, drawing parallels to Kanye West, Michael Jackson, and her own experience of being banned from Australia after tweeting that genocide is always wrong. She calls on Ed Sheeran to cancel his remaining tour dates in solidarity with Macklemore.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Opening: Terrell Farnsworth and the episode overview
Candace Owens: Happy Tuesday, you guys. What do I have in store for you all today? Well, I have some interesting footage of Mikey McCoy giving what appears to be his witness statement to an officer shortly following Charlie's assassination. Now, let's be clear — Mikey McCoy giving a witness statement is not immediately suspicious. In fact, it's expected. But there is a specific detail which caught my eye regarding who in particular was sent to take Mikey McCoy's statement, and I think it's rather controversial.
And in somewhat related news, have you noticed that Turning Point USA 2.0 — just to be clear, under CEO Erika Kirk — appears to be openly promoting sexual deviants to do their bidding for them? Like they're suddenly in with the crooks, really scraping the bottom of the barrel. Well, another person in their influencer orbit has been caught — some might say caught in 4K, literally sexually assaulting a woman. We're going to talk about that.
And lastly, we have to get into this Ed Sheeran dilemma. It is highly relevant to all things that we are talking about. An artist gets on stage, he says "Free Palestine," and suddenly powerful, sexual deviant-type billionaires rise up to try to destroy him. Is Ed Sheeran going to take a stand? Well, the artists around him certainly are. Does Ed Sheeran have the power to let power go? We're going to find out.
Welcome back to Candace. You know what, guys? I just want to say right at the top here — the more I think about it, just in the privacy of my own thoughts, the more outrageous it becomes that we continue to be gaslit about Terrell Farnsworth. I'm really angry about this Terrell Farnsworth bit. Just the amount of evidence that we have produced that he is shady. Terrell Farnsworth might just be my hill to die on. It is just reaching a level of absurdity. He's actually cartoonishly sneaky. We were talking about today a stereotype of trying to get away with it — an episode of Looney Tunes.
I just want to show you guys this really quick here up at the top. And before anyone falsely accuses me of having edited this clip, I will state for the record that the audio captured is in fact real and it has not been edited in any way whatsoever.
And that's all, folks. How is this legal? How is this legal? Something about that has to be illegal. We all agree, right? I'm just going to say it again for the record: should that man venture into the state of Tennessee, I will be conducting a citizen's arrest. Terrell Farnsworth, you are not safe here in the state of Tennessee. I will capture you. That's all, folks.
The recurring pattern: child sex crimes and the Charlie Kirk case
Anyway, now on to some rather curious things. From the very beginning of this, I've been on to them. I look in retrospect at the earlier episodes and I see why it was just a full-bore attack on Candace Owens — because I'm obviously very good at pattern recognition. I had very early on put together the connecting themes, spreadsheets. Haters can hate, but they're only making me stronger. And I recognized early on this weird recurring theme regarding human trafficking — people working with and around charities that are particularly tied to Eastern Europe, from Erika Kirk and her Romanian Angels to all of these characters that she kind of put around Charlie, these pastors.
I'm going to bring up and briefly go through this spreadsheet because it's relevant when we get to Mikey McCoy. So I'm going to look at this trafficking and sex abuse section. Obviously, that plane that took off — we never got an answer as to who was on it — but they do run this abuse trafficking victims charity. Colonel Otto Busher, of course, was accused of running a brothel with Romanian children from 2011 to 2015 at the Romanian military base. He worked with Erika's Romanian Angels during this time. David Fraudsham was the civilian commander stationed at Fort Wachuka who was charged with running a child sex abuse ring. Turning Point USA Faith — forget it, I mean, it's all over.
But in particular, Pastor Greg Lori — immediately after Charlie passed, the first tour that they did, the Make Heaven Crowded tour (which kind of sounds like a threat), Erika had him on the headlining paperwork. She did an event with Harvest Church immediately. Not a conflict for her that they are currently going through the court system being accused of trafficking children from Romania. You would think she'd want to avoid that, given what the internet has dug up about her past and her history, but no, she went into that. He denies the charges. He doesn't deny that people may have been being trafficked — he's basically saying it's not systemic and one person does not represent the church.
George Zinn, of course, was arrested for having pornographic images of children on his phone. We'll get into that in a bit. Andrew Pascado — you'll remember he was one of the people that the feds questioned on September 10th. He also in his own capacity works to ring the alarm on military Ukrainian sex trafficking into the United States. We have the Calvary Chapel Church — we've done episodes on this, riddled with pastor abuse stories. It almost seems systemic, like they are finding these shady characters and making them pastors, perhaps as a mechanism to control people. We'll discuss that in a bit.
Glenn Beck — his daughters were there. He was very much involved in the media on September 10th. Him and Tim Ballard started Operation Underground Railroad. It was Glenn Beck that funded it, Tim Ballard had the idea. Operation Underground Railroad is rescuing children from human sex trafficking. I believe their story began in Haiti. I did interview Tim Ballard. Erika lived in China and worked with child sex trafficking victims, according to her. We have not been able to locate who she was working with at that time.
TPUSA adviser Paul Vallely is the retired army general who ran psychological operations and co-wrote a book with Michael Aquino, who was a Satanist and a founder of the Temple of Set — a former Satanist who then became the founder of the Temple of Set, accused of abusing children at the Army Child Development Center. Victor Marks — obviously he says that he helps with human trafficking, and profits from his supplement company go to his child trafficking charity, All Things Possible. Yako Buyans also runs a charity for child sex abuse. Nela Buckman, who they announced as the biggest donor to Turning Point USA ever, is extensively involved in the rescue of children who are sexually abused and trafficked. Marcus Wada — that's more trafficking arms in Poland. Rick Cutler rescued kids from sex trafficking in South America via Operation Underground Railroad, which I mentioned was funded by Glenn Beck. Phil Goldsbury — it is his son that Mike Charlie — we told you about him co-founding Sofur Global Ministries, a 501(c)(3) that provides medical care and training to orphans in Romania, Albania, and Ukraine. Sorry — I don't know if Philip is the son. I think Philip is actually the son. They're both Philip Goldsbury. Pardon me.
The officials handling the Charlie Kirk case
We're going to talk about Officer Christopher Bagley, so I'm going to skip that for now. And now Judge Graph — we can come off of this spreadsheet. So anyway, this pattern then continues as it pertains to the individuals that are directly involved in handling the Charlie Kirk case in Utah.
Judge Graph, right — newly appointed by Governor Cox in August of 2025, just before Charlie's assassination — spent seven years with the Salt Lake City District Attorney's Office. I want you to remember that District Attorney's Office because we're going to speak about them a few times. He was prosecuting child and adult sexual crimes. Before then, he was leading the Special Victims Unit at the Utah County Attorney's Office — which we're also going to discuss — before moving to the Davis County Attorney's Office, where he continued handling physical and sexual abuse cases.
Credit to Baron Coleman's team for sourcing this clip. I think it's from around 2022 of Judge Graph discussing what percentage of the work that he does is related to that topic. Take a listen to Judge Graph in his own words.
Judge Graph: I am so grateful for what I do. My specialty and the area that I find the most fulfillment in is special victims prosecution. So 95% is sex crimes prosecution for children and adults. And so I am very grateful that I get to work with that segment and work with these victims, who are incredible. They are some of the most challenging cases — difficult, heartbreaking. It is where the most work is needed, and I'm grateful to work in that area. I work in it now and I will work in that area until I no longer can.
Candace Owens: 95%. Again, not accusing him of anything. These are just facts about all of these people. This is what they do. This is the space they work in.
Then, of course, there is the curious case of former undercover detective Mike Mitchell — the lynchpin to this entire case against Tyler Robinson, in my opinion. He's the one who claimed that he recognized Tyler Robinson in the news because he used to mentor him in Boy Scouts. He's then the one who goes over to Matt Robinson's house and gets them to call over Tyler, convincing them all that they should peaceably surrender despite Tyler Robinson's objections and his saying that he did not murder Charlie Kirk. Mitchell says, "Look, they have your information. You can do this the peaceable way or you can be subjected to police banging down your doors." It's worth noting that Mike Mitchell was an undercover detective in internet sex crimes against children. That was what he was doing.
Now, Officer Christopher Bagley — we briefly went over this. He is the officer they used at the preliminary hearing. His body cam footage notoriously went off after about 25 minutes. He's the one that found the screwdriver on the rooftop, which was their only link to Tyler Robinson — and actually the screwdriver DNA was proven to not definitively connect to Tyler Robinson. I'm not going to get into that today. He finds it, didn't capture the moment — unfortunately his body cam footage failed him. He too formerly worked in child sex crimes at the Utah County Sheriff's Office before he left and joined the UVU police force. I believe that was in 2022.
And of course, our decoy boy number one, George Zinn, who created a distraction by shouting "I did it! I did it!" in the immediate aftermath of the explosive going off. It turns out he was not working sex crimes over the internet — he was committing them. Because after arresting him, it was discovered that he had child pornography on his phone pertaining to a five-year-old. So this is a truly disturbed, sick individual. And it leads many sensible people to wondering whether or not he was blackmailed into doing that — into jumping up and down and creating a distraction. The New York Post covered this. He did in fact get sentenced for child sex crimes.
Michael George Carl and the first six search warrants
Now, beyond this, it was recently discovered by Baron Coleman that the first six search warrants involved in Charlie's assassination were all signed off by a man named Michael George Carl. We're talking about warrants — what we mean is that the police are required to file for search warrants if they want to seize or collect critical evidence. It was Michael George Carl who signed off on those warrants on the day of Charlie's assassination. I want you to take a listen to Baron describing his background — what Michael George Carl's background is in — and you won't be surprised.
Baron Coleman: Michael George Carl signed the first six search warrants in this case. Michael George Carl — he's a police officer. He signed the first six search warrants, including George Zinn's search warrant. We'll talk about George Zinn in just a second. So let's go look at Michael George Carl and see if we can find a connection to this industry. Why would Michael George Carl be so fast to be on this? Well, let's look here. This is his training that is listed on his affidavit. The FBI child exploitation task force. He was on the Lehigh Police Department in the Special Victims Unit. Worked crimes against children. Emphasis in online intimate crimes. Task force officer with the FBI child task force. Lead detective on several intimate crimes. Currently assigned with the Special Victims Unit — the SVU — with the Utah County Sheriff's Office. Primarily assigned to work cyber crimes involving the exploitation of youth, intimate exploitation of youth. That's his primary assignment. And he is the first one to go in and sign the first six search warrants, including on George Zinn. As an SVU detective, he's investigated several cases involving these types of crimes and minors — online enticement of these people. In his current assignment, he's investigating online crimes against young people. Also attended and completed training at the ICAC Bootstrap Academy. I'll talk about the ICAC in a second. He has since been approached by the FBI child exploitation task force and was reinstated as a task force officer with the FBI child exploitation task force. Now, ICAC is the Internet Crimes Against Children.
Candace Owens: So why is this guy immediately the one signing off on warrants? And I want to be clear — it's announced around 2:45 Utah local time that Charlie has passed. He has signed off on these first warrants at about 3:19 p.m. So he had these ready to go. And what are these warrants for? Tyler Robinson's phone. What's a guy who specializes in internet crimes against children doing signing off on these warrants?
Tyler Robinson's phone. The Google server that would have Tyler's phone location data on September 10th — he signs off on that. The cell towers surrounding UVU — he signs off on that. George Zinn's phone. Charlie's belongings at Tempogo. So we've been talking about where are Charlie's belongings — well, this is the person behind these warrants. Surveillance footage from Intermountain Health Utah Valley Hospital — that was a strange case. We said Charlie had a file there. We don't know. Then we learned that the surveillance footage was also seized from Intermountain Health Utah Valley because they said the perpetrator was driving around — that was their excuse to seize this footage. And also the warrants to search Ma and Amber Robinson's house as well.
Again, why would someone with a career emphasis on sex crimes against children be jumping in on this public assassination that had nothing to do with children or the internet?
The ICAC officer who took Mikey McCoy's statement
By the way, here's a diagram so that you can always record what we're sharing so people don't lose track of the people involved. Obviously George Zinn is the exception here as someone who was committing a crime against children. These other people are all specializing in this throughout their careers.
Now Baron mentioned the ICAC — again, that stands for Internet Crimes Against Children. And even if you somehow go, "Okay, maybe for some reason they decided that Michael George Carl is the right person to have gone after these warrants" — you would think it would be suspicious if the ICAC was immediately sent down to UVU to get involved in the case on the ground that day. I'm talking even before the State Bureau of Investigations gets there. You put ICAC on the ground.
I want you to take a look at this never-before-seen clip from September 10th, and I'm going to describe for you what you are seeing. If you look up in that top right quadrant, you're seeing Mikey. He is on the phone. And behind him, you see three officers that are walking with him — walking behind him, rather. They're going to soon be walking with him. The female that is amongst them is going to begin taking Mikey McCoy's statement.
What happens here is essentially Mikey is going to end his phone call with Danny Phillip. We know that is Danny Phillip he's on the phone with because we were given by Erika his call logs. So he is on the phone with Danny Phillip. He concludes that phone call and then his statement is going to be taken by that female. And she's wearing a vest — make no mistake — that says ICAC. His statement is taken by the Internet Crimes Against Children. That's who he's walking with.
Let's watch her begin to take this statement. And we can also show you some photos here. There she is — police. And then we'll show you on her vest where it says Utah ICAC. She hits record and they begin this process of getting what I am inferring is his statement on what took place on this day. Lots of questions here. I'm going to show you some photos so as not to be confused. Here is a still, and here is another still. Obviously this is taking place behind the Denali that Blake Neff — you can see right there. This is a clear picture of her vest showing "police" and then it says "Utah ICAC." So there's no mistake as to who she is with.
And this is taking place about 25 minutes after Charlie — shortly before 1:00 p.m. — Mikey McCoy still hanging around. So there was definitively no rush to get to the hospital. Again, they're standing behind the SUV that Blake Neff was in, being Uber-driven by Danny Phillip. It makes me think there was somebody in that front seat before. This is where his memory gets cloudy. Obviously, if they wanted to race to go be with Charlie or to follow him, they had that option. They had their car. They had a car that was there. Instead, Mikey's hanging around and this person is coming to take Mikey's statement.
Why Mikey of all people? Why Internet Crimes Against Children? Ladies and gentlemen, I'll ask the question: is Mikey McCoy a child? Was he being exploited over the internet on September 10th? If you answered no to these questions, you might be wondering — like me — why would it be the case that in the presence of the FBI, eventually the SBI, the UVU police already there, SWAT already there, US Marshals, even the Utah State University police undercover on the ground — why on earth would they appoint a woman from Internet Crimes Against Children to take Mikey McCoy's statement about 25 minutes after Charlie's hit? Make that make sense to me. Why are they there at all? Your job is to track criminals on the internet. This was not an internet crime, and no children that you should have known would be involved on a college campus. And even if you did, the crime didn't happen on the internet. So this feels weird to me.
What are they doing here? Who sent them? The question I had is literally: who sent them? Who made that call? And the likely answer — I can't be totally certain, but I am fairly certain — is that the Attorney General's Office is who controls the ICAC. That's who runs the ICAC: the Attorney General's Office of Utah. The same Attorney General's Office that then brought in Lance for a second statement in April before recording the interview. The Attorney General's Office is who the ICAC works under, and they are based in Salt Lake City. So maybe this woman worked locally out of the Orem Police Department. I don't know. I would like to know who she is, but it makes no sense that they would have tasked her with taking that statement.
By the way, it might be relevant if you're wondering about the history — because it's nationwide now, every state has an ICAC division. If you're wondering about who established that, the answer is the Department of Justice. The United States Department of Justice established the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Program back in 1998 to help states and local law enforcement fight technology-facilitated child sexual exploitation. Again, that's not what occurred on September 10th.
The federal control mechanism theory
So here's what I want to say. To me, when I look at everything that we've come across, it feels like an intentional control mechanism. In my opinion — my strong opinion — this feels like a control mechanism that's being directed by the feds. Like this is one big group. And for some reason, the feds wanted them in particular to have their hands everywhere in this case.
Because I have been saying since the beginning that it seems to me — again, opinion, allegedly according to Candace, the research that I have done — that Epstein's network re-emerged in the not-for-profit world in 2018. I believe that is actually a plausible motive, a plausible big reason that Charlie was murdered, given everything that we've looked at: Trump's phone call yelling at him for speaking about the Epstein case, Trump's protection of the Epstein network, the gaslighting of the American people. We know his donors are involved. We know that that is in particular what Tucker Carlson was speaking about on stage. He was speaking about Jeffrey Epstein. He was asking where Bill Ackman's money came from. And he was speaking to power when Charlie said to go Max. It was problematic.
And I believe that a machine was built around Charlie. He had no idea or understanding as to what was happening. Neither did I at the time. I was with him. I have expressed my belief that I think Erika was sent and set up to go after Charlie. I'm not going to pivot my opinion on that based off of everything that I have seen her do, which flies in the face of everything he stood for, where she has taken this organization, what we know, how we know he was being squeezed, the people that were lying about what Charlie was going through. There's no reason to lie about arguments that were being had the day before and pretending that he wasn't under pressure from Israel. We know that Epstein was Israel's guy. That's too much coincidence for me.
The Utah County Attorney's Office and David Levit
By the way, speaking of the Utah County Attorney's Office in general — because people have sent us so many tips about various things that have gone on that have been controversial — up until around 2022, the Attorney General of Utah was a man named David O. Levit. And there was a massive scandal. There were actually a few scandals regarding him. None of which have been proven. He's not been found guilty of anything. And he says that this was because of politicking and people who didn't want him to get elected. But I will say that I do not know, as a dirty political strategy, people accusing you of cannibalism. I'll say that as to one thing.
So I do want to tell you a couple of things about David Levit because this is curious. Back in 2017 — and if you're going, "Kenneth, this is going to have something to do with Eastern Europe" — duh. He was seeking support connected to adopting a northern Native American child, a Cheyenne child, and he met with the tribal president and proposed a relationship between the tribe and Ukraine. Okay. Involving buffalo. This is just — I don't know where else but an Erika Kirk story where you could suddenly be talking about Native Americans and Eastern Europe and going, "What's going on? Why is her mom doing so much stuff on Native American reservations?" We've got this same thread. And he basically proposed to have a relationship with the president of Ukraine that we installed after the color revolution — back in around 2005. He pitched this proposal for the tribe to have a relationship with Ukraine. You know what people like about Native American reservations? No rules. No federal rules. So I find that to be remarkably suspicious.
Then back in 2020, there was a federal HSI whistleblower case where an HSI analyst alleged that personnel received video evidence in April of 2020 potentially implicating Levit in violations of federal trafficking and Indian Child Welfare laws. But they ultimately failed to open an investigation. There was no criminal finding against Levit.
Then the big one that I was just telling you about, which involved cannibalism. In May and June of 2022, there was a ritual child abuse investigation. Again, this is the Attorney General. The Utah County Sheriff's Office announced that there was an investigation into alleged ritualistic child sexual abuse and child trafficking dating back approximately between 1990 and 2010. Levit himself then revealed in a 151-page victim statement associated with the case that he was named — that he and numerous others were being accused of ritual abuse, murder, and cannibalism. And he said that was being politically manufactured. I don't know — like I said, as a strategy to keep people out of office, I've never heard of someone being accused of cannibalism. That seems a bridge too far.
So there's a lot going on here in Utah that makes me very uncomfortable, and I wanted to share that with you because I think it's important to know that it feels like we're coming up against real power. Obviously from the beginning we have known that, given the players that are involved. But it is not a coincidence — in my opinion — that all of these people seem to have threads that relate or correlate them to this one specific issue of child sex abuse. I think that's remarkable and it should be noted.
Turning Point USA's influencer orbit and parental warning
When we get back, we're going to talk about some of these influencers that they have now partnered with, because this is a new organization under Erika Kirk. It should be noted — this is new. It is different. And as a parent myself, I would never ever ever allow my children to be involved with Turning Point USA. Ever. I want to say that strongly. I want to state that repeatedly, given everything that we have uncovered, the non-existent answers that we are being given. This is not the organization, in my view, that Charlie Kirk built. And their insistence on wanting to have access to high school students — it alarms me. I don't like it. It makes me uncomfortable.
I don't buy Erika's line at all. Actually, it's not difficult to answer questions when there are reasonable answers to be given. She has refused that. When I emailed before we ran the episode — when people came and said that she was working with the modeling agency and said that she was the person in charge of the modeling apartments in New York City that had Eastern European underage models — I emailed them and asked for a statement. They could have easily and flatly denied that. An office where Epstein frequented — someone he was very close with, Faith Kates, running that modeling agency — or a modeling agency started by John-Luc Brunel of France, who was found suicided, as they say, in France when Epstein went down. That would be something that a normal person would just respond to and say no. I find it very suspicious that she chose not to respond or to answer those allegations. And where there is smoke, there tends to be fire.
So I do want to again assert that until these questions are answered and responded to in a meaningful way, I do not believe that parents and college students — especially high school students — should be involving themselves with Turning Point USA. And this is not the full picture. By the way, the people that were working that day for Turning Point USA — we have found cases that are going on in the background that involve this same topic, and we're just holding on that for some specific reasons. But yeah, I wanted to assert that. We will be right back and we will discuss one of their influencers who was just revealed as someone who sexually assaults women in alleys. Old school, really. Be right back.
Matt Tardio: TPUSA's debunker exposed
All right. The Epstein network in general runs on blackmail. Obviously we all understand that. They find something about you — typically some form of sexual deviancy. This is why he was throwing parties. It's why they bring underage girls. Once they capture you, they sort of have you forever. That's the methodology.
And there has been something that just makes my skin crawl about a lot of these influencers who are clearly working 24 hours a day to delude the public into not believing their own eyes. I see these people — like Paramount Tactical — he makes my skin crawl. I just can't explain it, but there's something not right with him. And then they try to bring in these people as if they're experts. So instantly we saw Turning Point USA using Paramount Tactical — "Oh, he's a former Green Beret, so he can explain to you why magic bullets might split in the air and bounce off of Charlie's neck and it's a modern-day miracle."
And similarly they introduced this character Matt Tardio, because Turning Point never wants to explore the plausibility that it's not Tyler Robinson. Like I said, it's like their lives and freedom depend upon it being Tyler Robinson. And so they regularly bring in these people. Matt Tardio is one of these individuals. Popped up out of nowhere. Former Green Beret. And I'm going to show you just how quickly he got on the "it was not Israel who killed Charlie Kirk" narrative. This is an actual clip of him visiting Israel shortly after Charlie Kirk passed away. Take a listen.
Matt Tardio: I went for a run this morning over inside Tel Aviv along the beach, against Gro's better judgment. And I want you guys to see something, for all of you that think Israel thought it'd be a good idea to kill Charlie Kirk — because I know for some reason people think Israel wanted to kill Charlie Kirk. Now I don't read Hebrew, but I'm pretty sure they didn't do it. Just a thought.
Candace Owens: Well, there you go. If there's a poster of Charlie and they say they love Charlie, then Israel didn't do it. That seems like pretty sound positive evidence to me. I don't know why all people who murder people don't just think to do that — like it's a missing cat in the neighborhood. Put up a poster, and then if the feds or the police come, you say, "Well, it obviously wasn't me. Sir, look at this. I would never put up a photo of someone who I killed." I mean, just pointedly ridiculous propaganda. And like I said, they're never actually trying to pursue any evidence. They're just trying to shut it down immediately.
So Matt Tardio, after we revealed footage — and they were suggesting that we had manipulated it — which showed that the person walking in the parking lot, the maroon shirt person, is thicker, is much wider, and does not look like Tyler Robinson according to our own eyes, does not look like it is Tyler Robinson. The person is not as thin as was presented throughout the court hearing. After we presented that, of course, Turning Point USA didn't contact me going, "Wow, that's really interesting. Do you have more footage? We want to know who killed Charlie." Instead, they brought Matt Tardio onto the Charlie Kirk Show to debunk this. Take a quick look at this.
Charlie Kirk Show host: Without further ado, we've got Matt Tardio joining us now. He is a former Army Ranger sniper and explosives expert, and he's the host of the Speak the Truth podcast. So check that out on YouTube and other places. Matt, welcome back to the show. I'm grateful that you made some time for us today. I wanted to get into this because if you're at all plugged in on social media, you saw that our friend over there, Candace, released a video that it seems to be at least connected to, or a version of, or related to in some ways — I believe it was Exhibit 11 that the judge basically didn't allow to be seen by the news media during the preliminary hearing, but was shown privately in court. It could be that video. It could be a separate video. It could have been a recording of a video. We're not sure exactly. We'll play the video in just a second, but what was your initial reaction seeing this footage?
Matt Tardio: She's wrong. Again, she's wrong. I don't know how else to claim that she's wrong. She's wrong saying that — I forget what she said — basically, blown his shoulder out shooting it, or we should have seen the gunshot go off. She's wrong. Personally, in my opinion, stating that this is the lower quality video — and the rumors going around of it being a high quality video, therefore everybody is lying — there are very clear signs the video was compressed, or it was a screen recording, or a combination of both, before it ended up getting sent to her. And what did she call it? A lateral crawl. There's no such thing, as far as I know.
Candace Owens: There's no such thing as a lateral crawl. Okay. These are the experts they bring on. Well, guess what was just discovered? Thanks to The Bulwark, actually — they discovered that Matt had a little bit of a secret. And I'm sure it's not the only one. It's just one that was discovered. They published this, and it turns out that Tardio pleaded no contest in Portland to — and this is last October, October 2025 — felony coercion and misdemeanor harassment. According to police and Tardio's alleged victim, Tardio tried to take one of his fans at a protest back to his hotel room to have sex with. When she refused, he allegedly became forceful. He grabbed the woman, carried her down an alley before she managed to escape.
Now, the crime — in case you're wondering why he would plead no contest — the crime was actually caught in 4K in full detail, ironically, by surveillance cameras at the ICE facility. So where he took her, there were cameras and it got entirely captured on camera. And when interviewed by a Portland detective, Tardio's explanation was that left-wing Antifa activists had plotted to get him stoned. That makes entirely no sense — we're supposed to believe he took drugs from Antifa. Obviously that did not work, which is why he pled no contest. And so he's a sexual deviant. He's exactly the vibe that I get from all of these characters around Turning Point. You just add it to the pile.
And when people seem married to the Israel cause in a way that just unnerves me, you find this in their background — because Israel is very good at blackmailing people. We can protect you as long as you love Israel forever, no matter what, even if we are committing a genocide.
Macklemore, Ed Sheeran, and the Israel lobby in Hollywood
Which brings me to Macklemore. I am not a Macklemore fan by any stretch of imagination. I have different politics from Macklemore. But what is happening right now with Macklemore having been dropped from Ed Sheeran's tour — if you have not heard — is much bigger than him.
I will preface this by saying that he has made this a big issue, but this has been going on for decades. Actually, this was a battle that began with Michael Jackson, with Princess Diana, with Kanye West — people who did not understand what they were talking about in terms of the power that sits in Hollywood, which begins to act like a mafia if you have wrong-think, if you step outside of the bounds, if you challenge the power structure. And for a very long time, we existed under the media spell where they could tell us that this person was an anti-Semite, was a monster. In the case of Michael Jackson, they could say he was a pedophile. And we believed it because we had trust with the mainstream media. In fact, I'm one of the people who went down for saying genocide is always wrong. Look what they did to me.
So this has been going on for a very long time. But finally, we are reaching a pitch in this country where people are awake to it and they see that people are routinely being smeared and lied about for saying things that are true. And so Macklemore, at a recent tour stop — he was opening for Ed Sheeran — gave a completely unscripted speech and spoke about the current situation in Palestine. And of course, him making that statement caused a huge problem. I want you to hear what Macklemore actually said. It's important to know what he said so that you can destroy your relationship with the mainstream media who's going to lie about what he said. Take a listen.
Macklemore: I've been trying to figure out a way to say this all day. One of the reasons why I wanted to come on this tour was because I wanted to stand up here on stages and stadiums across America and say two words that are very near and dear to my heart. Free Palestine. I said free Palestine. I want those words to be loud and clear so the people from Gaza all the way to the occupied West Bank know that we have not forgotten them. And this next song was inspired by the bravery of Columbia University students who led an encampment movement that mobilized the entire world, opened up hearts — myself included. So thank you to those students that risked their diplomas, that risked their tuition, that risked their scholarships, that stood up and said no. CUAD students, Students for Justice in Palestine, and Jewish Voices for Peace — thank you. And to all of my Jewish brothers and sisters: criticism of Israel, criticism of apartheid, being against genocide, in no way is a criticism of you. My message is for peace, love, for all human beings to be treated with dignity, respect, and equality. So I say free Palestine. I say free Lebanon. I say free Cuba. I say free Congo. Free Sudan. Free all people in America living in fear over this terrorist organization ICE. None of us will be free until we are all free. This song is called Hensall.
Candace Owens: Nothing he said — whether you agree with his statements or disagree with his statements — there's no way you could cage that and say that's anti-Semitism, unless you are the pro-Israel lobby in America and around the world. That's what they get to do. They get to say and pretend that they see something else in your statement, and pretend that they're the ones suffering a holocaust while they're actually the ones enacting one. They are enacting a holocaust in Palestine. That's what's happening right now and it's being allowed to happen. The halls of power in DC are allowing it to happen.
Because what has taken place throughout time in America — they created Hollywood. The entire system has been going on. If you read Hollywood Babylon in my book club, you know exactly what I'm talking about. They have been doing this for so long and getting away with it because they have this much power.
So again, we are being met with a circumstance where it is David versus Goliath. This artist gets on stage and says something — and what happens? Robert Kraft, who I'm pretty sure also is a sexual deviant — didn't he have a whole massage parlor thing that happened, which is a form of sexual deviancy? Whatever. He's a billionaire. He owns the New England Patriots. The entire Patriot Stadium is his. So he mounted a peer pressure campaign because the lobby lobbied and they said that's not allowed. You cannot speak one bad word about Israel, even as we mercilessly kill children, even if it's Hunger Games and we're starving them and have IDF soldiers plucking them off and shooting them as they run for food. It's literally Hunger Games is what they're playing over there.
But they have power in Hollywood. So this is what he does. He pretends that there's something wrong with that statement. And what happens is Macklemore gets canceled as the opening act. And what does Ed Sheeran do? He sort of comes out with this statement.
And I want to be clear — I actually like Ed Sheeran as an artist. I actually ironically said to my husband, "I'd love to go to an Ed Sheeran concert." I like him because he's not perfect. He does tend to abstain from making political statements. He has made some in the past, particularly on the topic of Ukraine, which I disagree with him on. But he lives a pretty normal life, an unfabulous life, and I like that about him.
I will say, however, whether or not you are a person who traditionally does not take a stance on political issues or tries to stay out of it — the moment has come where you actually don't get to enjoy that luxury anymore. You don't get to, if you have a platform and you have more money than you could ever spend in your lifetime, look the other way when an artist is being peer-pressured for making a true statement about what is happening overseas and what our government is paying for.
And so what ended up happening was Robert Kraft was successful in having him canceled. Look at this old pervert. He was successful in lobbying for others because — oh, Israel, you can't do that. Ball-worshipping colony, den of thieves and vipers. You can't say anything about them. "We established Hollywood. We've got all the money. We've got all the stadiums." This is again what they did to multiple people.
And what happened is that thus far, three other people associated with this tour have now dropped out. Ed Sheeran tried to say, "Okay, I had no control over it. It was the stadiums that did this." Well, now his tour openers — three of them — have dropped out in solidarity with Macklemore. So this is applying maximum pressure.
The Goliath are the billionaires. The Goliath is the Israel lobby. It's not a lot of people, but they do have a lot of power. They have the ability to get you canceled, fired, to get you debanked — as they did to Kanye. They had the ability to get me banned from a country. I've never committed a crime. I'm banned from Australia. It's the wildest thing ever. I was going to do a tour on my Make Him a Sandwich book and talk about motherhood, but I said genocide is always wrong. And they took those statements and they lobbied, and I can't go into Australia.
So look, at the end of the day, I like this maximum pressure campaign and I believe that Ed Sheeran — this is not a traditional role for him. Again, he's never pretended to be some sort of a superhero. But he doesn't really get to use that as an excuse anymore. And if Ed Sheeran decides to go through with the remaining tour stops — I think there are only three left — then I'm calling upon the people that would be attending those concerts to pull out. Literally, don't go to this concert. It's such a small act that you can do. And it's not about Ed Sheeran. Like I said, I like him as an artist. I think you should go see him on a different day, go see him somewhere else. But for the rest of this tour, if you're listening to this podcast, I want to use my platform to say: don't go to these last three concerts.
We have to restore power to good people. What is happening at the top of government? What is happening as we've discussed and unpacked this Charlie Kirk case? These are truly sadistic and evil people who think they have enough money to force us to stay quiet. There is more of us than them. I have said this over and over again to you guys. Charlie would ask me that question: "Candace, what's the one thing that every slave colony throughout human history had in common? Every slave plantation, every slave civilization had in common?" And I said, "What?" And Charlie said, "Well, there were more slaves than there were masters." We haven't yet clicked to the fact that actually, no — we have the power.
And this is why I went through great pain to explain to you guys why I loved Kanye West, what that messaging meant to me, the willingness to be canceled and to stand up for something and to have the power to let power go. I believe Charlie Kirk had that power and it cost him his life in the end. Kanye clearly had that power. He's now literally on top of the world doing a tour and still getting turned down by stadiums, but then just going to the ones that open their doors. Let power realign.
It'll be okay, Ed Sheeran, if they shut you down and you can't play their stadiums. You'll probably get sued. This is Justin Bieber's story too. Why do you think Justin Bieber is finally free and happy and he doesn't even care, after he got sued for canceling the rest of his tour? Cancel the rest of your tour, Ed Sheeran. Do something brave. Cancel the rest of your tour and stand in solidarity with the people, not the power. Not the corrupt power apparatus. Not with the Robert Krafts of the world. Not with the people who can try to force you to accept a genocide.
We just need a better cast of characters on the stage right now. And in Hollywood, there's been way too much silence on this issue. Who cares if it costs you a couple of million dollars if you get sued? Like I said, Bieber lived through it. And what is he doing now? He has reminded himself that the talent was always with him. He's now playing at Coachella, making money, just him with his old videos on YouTube. Before he got locked up in all of these contracts that were not sensible, he burned it all — figuratively — to the ground. And now he's back to just being the Biebs.
Same lesson I learned. Was it hard to walk away from it? Was it hard when you're sitting in a room and they're gaslighting you and they're saying, "Don't you see how tweeting 'genocide is always wrong' is hurtful to Ben Shapiro, Candace? Don't you see?" No, I actually don't see. The statement stands. Genocide is always wrong, no matter who is advocating for it.
So I'm calling upon Ed Sheeran to cancel his last shows, for whatever it's worth. Like I said, I like you. I will support you as an artist and I do not think that you are a bad person at all. I think you're in a bad situation and you're not used to being brave. You're not used to being the one that speaks out. You register to me as the person who probably flushed red in the back of a classroom when the teacher called on you. I get that. It's not your personality archetype. But you have the ability to do something good. And if he can't do that, then the rest of us — the people who are going to those last three show stops — should cancel their tickets. More power to the people.
Viewer comments and personal reflections
All right, top comments from yesterday's episode. Someone wrote, "Didn't Erika immediately forgive that young man without anyone even confessing, let alone repenting?" Yeah, different message coming from Alex Clark now, where I guess whoever she's sitting down with is saying, "No, someone must repent first and then you can forgive them."
This next user writes, "Tyler only limps in the video that we revealed yesterday as he gets closer to where he's been told there is a camera." I noticed that as well. It's like when he thinks he's too far off, he's not limping. And then as he gets closer, the limp starts. A lot of questions surrounding that footage. Again, I just share it so that we have more information. I don't know why that upsets Turning Point USA so much. Like, if you're really trying to just get to the truth, why would more information released to the public upset you?
This one was from yesterday, but I forgot to read it. This is from Jenna. She writes, "Great interview on Stephen A. Smith's podcast. I'm praying for you and your family as you bring truth to the world. Congrats on baby number five, the Exaltation of the Holy Cross today. May his passion bring you peace." Thank you so much. I got a lot of your comments about the Stephen A. Smith podcast. I mean, I just say what I think everywhere, and I do feel the power shifting. I feel stronger, but I also think we as a society are stronger. And I'm seeing that in the bravery of people that are now speaking out and giving me information. People were sort of fearful in the beginning about being a source or providing information. And it does seem that iron sharpens iron, and bravery inspires other people to be brave.
Ali writes, "Erika gets to go on a media tour with Fox, Bari Weiss, and Glenn Beck to paint you as a liar and a crazy person before you even said a bad word about her, but you can't share a meme or two. It's not like she was minding her business at home grieving when you went after her." It's exactly right. The entire tour was about debunking Candace. She had first sent out the troops — the Alex Clark types — because she likes to keep her hands clean. But when she then did that little media tour, she was directly responding to things that I had said on the podcast. And again, these were not things that I said about her. I abstained entirely. The internet does not forget. And yeah, I don't trust Erika and I don't like her as a human. I don't think that she loved Charlie. I refuse to believe that. Because no person who loved someone would allow everything that he was fighting in the end to then be protected, to be platformed. You're his wife. That is the ultimate betrayal.
Seven Sheets writes, "You are a beautiful strong voice for truth and authenticity. Not sure where else I could go for such eloquence. I will always support the brave. Saying genocide is never okay — that is controversial? Will love, prayers, and faith." Yes, it was exceedingly controversial. I still have to laugh at being brought into an office and questioned about that statement and then totally told, "No, that's not what you meant." What do you mean it's not what I meant? That's what I tweeted. "No, Israel — you can't. You're talking about Israel. How can you not see it's anti-Semitic and how it impacts Ben's life?" Like, what? So crazy to reflect upon.
Tony Hill writes, "Hi Candace, watched Piers and saw John Mappen as a guest. He did well defending you while also not giving too much, considering he had three people constantly talking over him. It's nice to see real friends having your back. We love and support you always." Yes, I did see and hear that — it was trending over the weekend, that interview with John Mappen and Brandon Tatum. I sort of took a vow of silence this weekend because I just kind of wanted to sit in the one-year anniversary of Charlie's death. And for some reason, I felt like a lot of people were discussing me.
John Mappen was with me when I spoke to Brandon Tatum — I was in Iceland, just because of the time difference. So I was literally fishing in Iceland with John Mappen and my husband. Me and Brandon were trying to find a time to speak, and the only time that could work with his schedule and my schedule was when I was like, "Hey guys, I've got to go back to the car. I'm going to take a phone call." So they were fishing on the river and I went back and had a conversation with Brandon which lasted about an hour and a half.
And I understand that people don't understand the relationship between me and Brandon. I can just try to put it to you very plainly. If I suspected that Brandon did not actually believe what he was saying — that he was stating things and then privately expressed the exact opposite — I would be calling Brandon out. Brandon is authentic in what he is saying he believes. He is authentic in his belief about Erika. I have expressed to him my thoughts to the contrary. It was not a major theme of our conversation. When we were in Iceland, we were talking about something else actually.
I don't expect or demand that my friends agree with me on everything. I just don't. It's not who I am. I expect my friends to hear me out. I expect my friends to at least hear my perspective. And Brandon granted all of those things. And so we just disagree. We disagree on Turning Point USA. We disagree on Erika. But we do have a lot of history and my family adores him. And like I said, way back when me and Charlie were coming up — when you have those bonds that are forged — it was similar with Brandon. I was closer to Brandon than Charlie was, and I was closer to Charlie than Brandon was to Charlie. So yeah, that's that. I'm an extremely loyal person. I obviously see your comments and I see your frustrations, but if I have a frustration with Brandon, I'm going to go directly to him. You learn to respect it about me. I am just a direct person and I don't like things playing out publicly. I just don't think it's necessary.
Brooke writes, "Talking about Charlie Kirk and the impact that you're making as a free thinker really moves me. Kanye knows it and I know his truth. What you're doing matters. Free thinking, never stop. Charlie is proud. Love from Houston." Thank you, Brooke.
Angelina writes, "I just finished watching your anniversary video to Charlie. I think I filled a pool by accident. There wasn't a second that a tear was not falling from my face. God bless you, Candace." Thank you. I'm just so happy that you guys can see who Charlie was, because he was so great and so funny and just so fun. I loved spending time with him. I loved traveling. We loved the road trips. They were the best. When you travel with someone, you just really get to know them. That's the only way you can say it. And it was a fun time that I look back on fondly. And I miss our ignorance. I wish thinking the world was simpler than it is. I wish thinking that we could solve it through politics. And the betrayal that he has suffered — it weighs heavily on me. And it's why we fight daily and keep his name and this story focused so that it's not something that we just skip over. It will not be another JFK.
Cindy writes, "Coincidence is God's way of remaining anonymous. You are uncovering things that others miss or don't want to admit. So go Max indeed."
And Zamit writes, "Candace, Charlie Kirk would have wanted the world to know the significance of your return to his TPUSA." I'm not sure if you mean like in that last few days when he was telling people that he was going to bring me back — but he had made up his mind and he was turning against Israel. It's just a fact. It's just a fact. They can't undo that fact. It drives them crazy. He saw what it was. He looked to the beast and he said no to it. And that's that.
Lastly, Joselyn writes that I should totally consider dubbing my videos in Spanish. We have a Spanish channel, Joselyn. You're just not on the right channel. You can head on over to our Spanish, French, or Portuguese channels. We have links in the description.
Anyway, you guys — we are way over time today. By the way, if you have something you'd like to share with us, more tips at candaceowens.com. We'll have more hospital insights and things for you. A very interesting story to tell you guys tomorrow. Baron reminded me — he's like, "Are you going to cover this story?" And I was like, "You are so right. This is very weird." It's about a meeting that Erika took shortly before Charlie's passing, which should be brought — sunlight is the best disinfectant.
Also reminding you guys, we have book club on Friday. Bearing False Witness by Rodney Stark is the book that we have started. So if you'd like to join the book club, now is a great time to do so. Very relevant as we are talking about a lot of the trappings of faux Christianity, which is certainly taking place today. I don't think anybody watches Alex Clark and goes, "Hmm, that's a well-rounded Christian girl who's definitely telling me the truth about what I should be following, what I should be pursuing." How wild to say it's a form of Gnosticism to not believe the CIA. Like — "You shouldn't seek hidden knowledge. You shouldn't seek the Epstein files. That's hidden knowledge. That's a form of Gnosticism." These people are crazy. Turning Point is ghetto. TPUSA is ghetto now. I'll see you guys tomorrow.