LARRY with Larry O'Connor

For years establishment Democrats kept the socialist left the way you'd keep a pet alligator — feed it, show it off, use it to scare Republicans. Then Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries and Nancy Pelosi came downstairs and found it sitting in their chair.

Larry O'Connor lays out the mistake Democrats have made in these midterms: they invited Marxists into the coalition because they were good at organizing, and the organizers organized them. Bernie Sanders, AOC, the DSA and Zohran Mamdani won the primaries. Now the party has a turnout solution that has become a persuasion problem. 

Nowhere is that clearer than Michigan, where Democrats nominated Abdul El-Sayed, 54% of voters say his positions are too extreme, and the state's Jewish attorney general refused to attend her own party's convention over concerns for her safety.

Check out the latest news from Heartlander News: https://heartlandernews.com/

Eight weeks from the midterms, every cable panel is explaining the 2026 election with a single number — Donald Trump's approval rating — while telling you Trump isn't on the ballot.

Larry O'Connor makes the case that the number answers the wrong question. Elections are choices, not referendums, and being annoyed about grocery prices is not the same as wanting a 33-year-old democratic socialist running the country.

He walks through why August polling always looks like this for Republicans, who actually answers polls in August, and why the "polls are tightening" story arrives on schedule every single October. Then the part nobody on television will connect: the anger about Iran isn't about the Strait of Hormuz, it's about what happened to gas prices — and the national average everyone quotes is being pulled up by one state.

Gavin Newsom's California adds a premium to every gallon through regulations and taxes, and it lands in the number Democrats then blame on Trump. Plus the 2018 comparison the media keeps reaching for, why 2022 is the better analogy, and what Joe Biden's raid on the Strategic Petroleum Reserve actually bought him.

Check out the latest news from Heartlander News: https://heartlandernews.com/

Kmele Foster asked Jemele Hill one question about capitalism on CNN, and she had no answer for it. Jemele Hill argued on a CNN panel that capitalism is bound up with white supremacy.

Kmele Foster answered with Adam Smith, private property and gains from trade, and asked her what any of it has to do with white supremacy. She never answered on the set. The next day she posted the argument on X and was met with a Community Note: enslaved labor produced roughly 10 to 13 percent of GNP around 1860, cotton 5 to 6 percent, and American economic dominance came from northern industrialization after 1865. She posted again and drew a second note. Larry O'Connor then turns to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on the collapse of socialism across the Western Hemisphere and his description of American socialists as overeducated and underachieving, and to the House resolution denouncing socialism that 192 Democrats voted against. Tim Burchett walks off the floor with the last word.

Check out the latest news from Heartlander News: https://heartlandernews.com/

Kathy Hochul said on live television that she wishes ICE would disband, then blamed Donald Trump for defunding the police.

At a press conference the New York governor claimed the federal government is withholding 40 percent of the state's counterterrorism money, $87 million, and translated it as Donald Trump defunding the police. Larry O'Connor walks through the vote: not one New York Democrat, not Chuck Schumer and not Hakeem Jeffries, voted to fund the Department of Homeland Security during the shutdown their own party ran at ICE and the Border Patrol. Hochul then goes further on television, calling ICE a rogue agency and saying she wishes it would disband and go back to the old Immigration and Naturalization Service. That is Abdul El-Sayed's talking point, and Larry sets it against the decades when the same coalition called the INS a secret police force, and against Hochul's own campaign stop at a New York mosque.

The clip closes on the Times Square stabbing that killed one person and left another hospitalized, and the NYPD officers who ended it after a taser failed.

Check out the latest news from Heartlander News: https://heartlandernews.com/

Kamala Harris told supporters the midterms are being rigged and to make the vote "too big to rig" — language that would have gotten a conservative channel demonetized two years ago.

Larry O'Connor walks through what the Supreme Court actually allowed on Post Office ballot delivery, and the difference nobody on cable will explain: an absentee ballot you request because you're traveling, ill or in the military, versus states like California, Oregon and Colorado mailing live ballots to everyone on a stale voter roll.

Then Scott Jennings takes apart a CNN panelist arguing that Trump is trying to stop people voting — while the host interrupts him and lets her finish. Trump's own words on turnout are in there too, and they say the opposite of what the panel claimed.

Plus the California man arrested for registering and voting illegally, who was texting a federal agent about his midterm plans while he did it.

Check out the latest news from Heartlander News: https://heartlandernews.com/

Abdul El-Sayed refused to say Hasan Piker's name at a Michigan press conference, calling him "a social media person in California" — after inviting him to campaign.

Larry O'Connor breaks down El-Sayed's damage control: the "hurt people hurt people" statement after the attack on a synagogue and a Jewish summer camp in Michigan, the walk-back that never quite becomes an apology, and the shift from "we" to "I" depending on whether he's distancing himself or defending himself.

A Fox News reporter presses him on whether he'll condemn Piker, notes that Jewish voters are asking the question, and El-Sayed shakes his head while his press secretary tries to take control of the room. Then Dave Weigel gets Piker on the record: El-Sayed's campaign asked him to come to Michigan, not the other way around.

Larry raises the question no one has asked yet — whether any money moved between the El-Sayed campaign and Piker's podcast for the appearances, the travel, or the mentions. Plus Mike Rogers on Democrats for Rogers in Detroit, the Haley Stevens voters in play, and the new ad built entirely out of El-Sayed's own words.

Check out the latest news from Heartlander News: https://heartlandernews.com/

Larry O'Connor sits down with David From of Americans for Prosperity — host of the American Potential podcast — for a Small Business Month conversation that starts with a tribute to Dolly Parton as one of the great American entrepreneurs and ends with the roadblocks strangling small business owners. David From tells the story of Colin Raby, a Louisiana farmer merging AI with agriculture, and Chris Thomas, an Ohio veteran who handed his employees a 30-40% raise after the Trump tax cuts. Plus the Mike Rowe statistic about the trades that stopped David cold.

Nominate a small business owner at https://www.AmericaBuildsFreedom.com

Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner stood at a podium and said the White House ballroom is going to get blown up in an "official ceremony" — and that he'll keep a piece of it as a paperweight on his desk. Larry rolls that clip, then the one where Krasner tells ICE agents he'll hunt them down "the way they hunted down Nazis," then Attorney General Todd Blanche's on-air response. Plus: Krasner gets cornered by a kid with a camera in a public park and completely loses it, and Kathy Griffin resurfaces to explain why she's the real victim of 2017.

For complete Medicare guidance, dial 580-308-0975 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter, or go to https://askchapter.org/oconnor

CNN told viewers that Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed was "distancing himself" from Twitch streamer Hasan Piker — then Manhattan Institute's Jesse Arm read the anchor her own words back on live TV and the whole framing fell apart. Larry plays El-Sayed's FULL statement, the one CNN cut, and it never names Hasan Piker, never quotes what Piker said, and never says El-Sayed disagrees. Then Piker himself goes live to confirm it: El-Sayed isn't moderating on anything, and he's still their guy.

For complete Medicare guidance, dial 580-308-0975 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter, or go to https://askchapter.org/oconnor

Chris Cuomo told Andrew Kolvet that Democrats have "learned their lesson" and will never reopen the border — so Larry O'Connor rolls the tape on what Democrats are saying right now. Kathy Hochul just turned all of New York into a sanctuary state and threatened legal action against any sheriff who cooperates with ICE, while Sarah McBride called enforcing federal immigration law un-American. Then Larry asks to play George Stephanopoulos' interview with the mother of a Fairfax County stabbing victim killed by an illegal immigrant — and finds out on air that it doesn't exist.

For complete Medicare guidance, dial 580-308-0975 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter, or go to https://askchapter.org/oconnor

Donald Trump imposed a 50% tariff on Canadian products after trade talks collapsed at the last minute, and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney went straight to the war framing — claiming Canada "got attacked" and that the US made threats against the French language and Quebec culture. US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer went on CNBC and called that story flatly untrue, laying out what the negotiations were actually about. Larry O'Connor breaks down the whole thing, plus Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's blunt assessment of what Canada actually brings to a fight with the United States.

For complete Medicare guidance, dial 580-308-0975 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter, or go to https://askchapter.org/oconnor

The New York Times reported that Jared Kushner met privately with Hakeem Jeffries — and the online left completely lost it. So Jeffries sat down in front of a Brooklyn housing project in a hat eight sizes too big and recorded a slow-motion selfie video to calm his own base, and it is the single most ridiculous thing you will see today. Larry O'Connor breaks down the pauses, the "Trump cartel" line, the Wolf Blitzer interview that followed on CNN, and the one thing Hakeem Jeffries never once said Democrats would actually DO for you.

Raise your hand as a Social Security voter: https://AARP.org/SocialSecurityVoter

Hillary Clinton accused Donald Trump of running "socialism for the rich" and enriching himself in office — so Larry O'Connor asks the question nobody in media ever puts to her. Bill Clinton was making $35,000 a year as governor of Arkansas and the couple left the White House in debt. So where did Hillary Clinton's fortune actually come from? Plus her claim that the Founders would be "appalled" and George Washington "heartsick" — from the party that tore their statues down.

Raise your hand as a Social Security voter: https://AARP.org/SocialSecurityVoter

Donald Trump imposed a 50% tariff on Canadian products after trade talks collapsed at the last minute, and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney went straight to the war framing — claiming Canada "got attacked" and that the US made threats against the French language and Quebec culture. US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer went on CNBC and called that story flatly untrue, laying out what the negotiations were actually about. Larry O'Connor breaks down the whole thing, plus Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's blunt assessment of what Canada actually brings to a fight with the United States.

For complete Medicare guidance, dial 580-308-0975 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter, or go to https://askchapter.org/oconnor

ICE just refused a Freedom of Information Act request about the Ilhan Omar immigration fraud investigation — citing the exemption for ongoing enforcement proceedings, which effectively confirms the probe is live and could end in deportation. Larry O'Connor walks through the marriage timeline Omar has never explained, then plays her own TikTok calling ICE a "racist terror campaign." Plus: CBS News builds a sob story around a deportee, Nebraska Republican Don Bacon champions another one until you read the actual article, and Nevada's Secretary of State says the quiet part out loud about which voters Democrats are protecting.

For complete Medicare guidance, dial 580-308-0975 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter, or go to https://askchapter.org/oconnor

Eleven months after Charlie Kirk's assassination, Hasan Piker stood on a Portland stage and sang a mocking version of "We Are Charlie Kirk" — then got booed by his own audience when he tried to walk back his claim that America deserved 9/11. Larry O'Connor plays the old clip of Kirk good-naturedly photobombing Piker's stream to show exactly how far this went. Plus: the Washington Post is ordered to rehire Karen Attiah, and a Free Beacon video catches Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed rationalizing terrorism to a nearly empty hotel banquet room — and telling CAIR that Oklahoma's Sharia-law referendum came from the same forces that destroyed Black Wall Street.

For complete Medicare guidance, dial 580-308-0975 to speak with my trusted partner, Chapter, or go to https://askchapter.org/oconnor

A new AARP poll of Michigan likely voters has the Senate race in a dead heat — Democrat Abdul El-Sayed at 48% and Republican Mike Rogers at 47%. Larry O'Connor sits down with AARP's John Hishta and pollster Bob Ward of Fabrizio Ward to break down the generational split driving it: Rogers up 9 points with voters 50-plus and 13 with seniors, El-Sayed up 14 with voters under 50. With voters over 50 projected to make up at least 59% of Michigan's midterm turnout — and a 15-point motivation gap in their favor — this race may come down to who actually shows up.

Visit https://www.AARP.org/votes for more information

Jill Biden has a brand new theory about what happened to Joe Biden on that debate stage, and podcaster Jamie Kern Lima handed it to her: maybe somebody laced his drink. It flatly contradicts what she said two months ago when she claimed she thought Joe was having a stroke, and it contradicts her own claim that she hadn't seen him for weeks. Larry O'Connor walks the entire June timeline she was standing right next to him for, then rolls the Obama Library footage of her leaving her dying husband alone on stage.

Chuck Schumer got asked about the DSA takeover of his party and called it a "big tent" — right before Western Lensman's side-by-side paired his praise for Abdul El-Sayed with El-Sayed's own threat to him. Then El-Sayed posted a clip of himself telling Detroit he learned what it means to be a person of color by reading Malcolm X, while Wayne County's black voters keep breaking toward Mike Rogers. Plus Florida's new Democrat Senate nominee Angie Nixon on Charlie Kirk, ICE, and why she says Republicans are "literally trying to kill us."

Karen Bass got so desperate for cash that she went on camera and revealed LA's dirty little secret: a "Super Match" program where the city turns your $5 donation into $35 — with taxpayer money. Fox News broke down how the match quietly went from 1-to-1 to 6-to-1 without voters ever approving it, while Nithya Raman got grilled over hiring the same firm that ran Graham Platner's collapsed Maine campaign. Plus a Michigan whistleblower says the state's software auto-registers non-citizens, and Ed Markey calls photo ID an impeachable offense.