Socialism Likely to Win in the Short Term, But There's a Catch | Christopher Rufo

**Christopher Rufo** (0:00)
Seems like the big shift on the left over the last two years has been moving from culture to economic. I think the kind of woke ideology related to race and gender, for example, has lost a lot of steam. The left has a talent for metamorphosizing. Issues of Israel-Palestine, issues of affordability and inflation are really what is driving this new wave of left-wing activism.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:25)
You have my commitment, you have my word, and together on June 24th, we're going to win this race so that next year we freeze the rent.

**Christopher Rufo** (0:33)
Even someone like Zohran Mamdani, the mayor of New York, you notice during his campaign that was laser-focused on issues related to economy, billionaires, Gaza, and that was enough to get him over the finish line. Despite a terrible evidence base for something like rent control, rent control is actually very popular if you poll voters, especially in these big municipalities with high rents. So there's a lot of work to be done on the right to persuade people to think more clearly and more effectively about how the economy works. You know, we've been doing this reporting in California. It's kind of amazing because you have open-air markets that have been decriminalized and for all intents and purposes legalized. California is giving free solar panels to illegal aliens, free change surgeries to transgender migrants from Latin America. What they're doing is like a house of horrors that once you enter is so far beyond what you could imagine. I think someone like Candace is actually very intelligent, but there is a limit on that kind of personality. That personality eventually burns out. When you saw that Candace Owens was getting 5 million views for YouTube video, were you strong enough to resist the temptation to lobotomize yourself for clicks? Were you strong enough to resist it when it was most tempting?

**Dave Rubin** (1:47)
How afraid are you that there won't really be two years left because if the Republicans lose the midterms, Trump is lame duck, likely impeached. Potentially, there's really three months left.
All right. I've been informed. I'm Dave Rubin and this is The Rubin Report. Joining me today is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of America's Cultural Revolution, How the Radical Left Conquered Everything, Christopher Rufo. Welcome back to The Rubin Report.

**Christopher Rufo** (2:23)
It's good to be with you.

**Dave Rubin** (2:25)
I called you Christopher, but it's Chris, really. Does anyone call you Christopher? I guess your parents probably call you Christopher still.

**Christopher Rufo** (2:30)
My mother, my wife, others. Yeah, that's about it.

**Dave Rubin** (2:35)
Just people trying to control you. All right, Chris Rufo. It is good to see you, my friend. It's been a while since I've had you on. You, fair to say, you are like the, you're the giant slayer when it comes to what's going on with the left these days, huh?

**Christopher Rufo** (2:50)
Yeah, well, I appreciate that. And it's been interesting. It seems like the politics has shifted very quickly since Trump came back into power at the beginning of last year. And so it's a question of adaptation. And so my own work, I've been kind of moving in different directions. Focusing a lot on California right now.
But yeah, many giants have been slayed and it seems like unfortunately they keep popping up. So some slang may be in the future as well.

**Dave Rubin** (3:21)
So, all right, we're gonna talk about the left. We're also gonna talk about some wackiness on the right. And you've had to do some slang in that department as well.
But let's start with the left stuff. It seems to me that right now where we're at is that the woke thing is sort of morphing into its final stage, which is this sort of commie Islamist amalgamation. Like we're almost in that thing having fully burst forth. Do you think that that is a fair assessment?

**Christopher Rufo** (3:56)
Yeah, I think that's right. And it seems like the big shift on the left over the last two years has been moving from culture to economics. And I think the kind of woke ideology related to race and gender, for example, has lost a lot of steam. It's severely underwater as a matter of public opinion. And the left has a talent for metamorphosizing. And that's what we're seeing now. And issues of Israel-Palestine, issues of affordability and inflation are really what is driving this new wave of left-wing activism. And even someone like Zohran Mamdani, the mayor of New York, who had previously repeated all of those woke slogans from the George Floyd years, you notice during his campaign, he kept his mouth tightly shut in all of that kind of rhetoric and was laser focused on issues related to economy, billionaires, Gaza.