A Look Back At 2024 | Ben’s Best Moments
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Alrighty folks, 2024 was an insane year. I know for all of us, but I have to admit that for me particularly, it was a totally crazy year. We're going to go through the highlights of 2024, best moments of 2024. This year started off the bang. January was nuts. I mean, totally crazy. So there was one week in January where I visited Auschwitz with Elon Musk. I did a debate with the internet streamer Destiny, and I released a number one charting rap single. That was all in one week. It was totally psychotic.

bizarre, weird. I mean, ran the gamut from moving to strange, for sure. It's about third week of January, I went to Auschwitz with Elon Musk. That was because the prior year, in 2023, I had done an ex-forum with Elon where he talked about anti-Semitism. And one of the people who came on the line was a representative of a Jewish organization in Europe who asked Elon about visiting Auschwitz. And Elon had expressed some interest in doing it. I got a call from some folks who are close to Elon asking if I would come with him to visit Auschwitz.

And so we went and we did it. It was an amazing experience. First of all, Elon is obviously a brilliant mind, but also a person who sees the world through a unique lens. I've said before that Elon, whenever you talk to him, it feels like sort of an alien who has descended on the planet in order to observe the humans and see how they act and how they tick and all the rest of it. Watching Elon experience the height of...

human evil in real time was an amazing, amazing thing. Walking the grounds of Auschwitz and then walking the grounds more specifically of Birkenau, which I think was in some ways even more moving than Auschwitz. And then I had the opportunity to sit down with Elon and we did a couple of things together. The first thing that we did was an episode of The Search where

where we talked about everything from AI to the future of space flight to free speech. You innovate and you make new things, and there is a drive to hem in that innovation. The window of opportunity to make life multi-planetary and secure the future of consciousness may be open for a long time or may be open for a short time. I'd be surprised if we don't have humans on Mars within 10 years. Wow. Free speech is the bedrock of democracy.

And free speech is what allows atrocities to be called out and for people to be aware of them. DEI effectively is a conspiracy theory in which there's a cadre of powerful people who are at the top and they control everything else that's happening. And because those powerful people are at the top, they are exploiting everybody else and they have to be taken down more than one peg. If we're going to get out of DEI, what's the best way to get out of DEI? Well, I think DEI is starting to fade.

First of all, DEI is actually illegal because it discriminates on the basis of race, sex, sexual preference and all sorts of other things. That is actually illegal. I think DEI is on its last legs. It's going to be removed because it's illegal actually.

I said, literally. We did that kind of spur of the moment, to take you behind the scenes. It was unclear whether Elon was going to have time to do it. He made time to do it. We cleared out a very small conference room, made it look decent. This is all with about 20 minutes notice. And then we sat down with Elon, had this wonderful conversation, and then we went straight from there to the stage to discuss Auschwitz and anti-Semitism and the increase in anti-Semitism since October 7th. How do you balance the necessity for free speech with all these critiques about, you know,

What is hate speech? It's difficult to get to perfect truth, and sometimes people have different interpretations of truth, but one can always aspire to be as accurate as possible and to minimize the error between what is being said and reality. That same exact week, we released a debate that I did with the internet streamer Destiny. Now, Destiny has become famous for some very strange reasons over the course of the rest of the year, but it was a three-hour debate or so on Lex Friedman's show, talking about everything from Donald Trump

on foreign policy to domestic policy on education. When you say, if we could give every kid an iPad, would you give every kid an iPad? The question is not,

If I had a replicator machine from Star Trek, would I give everybody an enormous amount of stuff? Sure, I would. Every resource is finite. Every resource is limited. And you have to prioritize what are the outcomes that you seek in terms of the means with which you are seeking them. I don't think any amount of changes in the schools will create two-parent households. Right? We can't bring a... I totally agree with you. That's why I think that the fundamental educational problem is not, in fact, a schooling problem. I think that it pre-exists that. It is.

I think pretty entertaining. I think the best debates are typically good conversations as opposed to sort of tactical attempts to stab a knife in somebody. Those are actually very easy to do in a lot of ways. The more interesting debates are the ones where you have sort of a freewheeling conversation. Lex does a great job with that. And then that same week, we also decided to release the song Facts with Tom McDonald. Call me a fake.

Go, go, go, go.

This is the funniest thing we did all year, and maybe the funniest thing in human history, as it turns out. So this came about because Tom McDonald, he and I had met a while ago, and we had had some backroom conversations. I had him on the show, and at the time, he suggested maybe we should do a song together. I was like, okay. And then he got kind of serious about it. He said, maybe we should do a song together. I said,

Okay. And he wrote facts. And then he and I sort of combined on my verse. Look at the stats. I've got the facts. My money like Lizzo. My pockets are full. No. Get out. You've got to be kidding me. Was this AI or is this real? You're blowing money on strippers and cars. You go into prison. I'm on television. Dogs, no one knows who you are. Keep hating on me on the internet. My comments section all woke Karen's. And I make racks off compound interest. Y'all live with your.

He sent over a version. I sent over a different version. My version was too hardcore, by the way. Tom will admit as much that my version went too hard. It was really, really harsh. It was vicious rap battle kind of stuff against Nicki Minaj and Cardi B and Sexy Red and all the rest of the group. And then we recorded it.

That took, you know, maybe a couple of days to record it. We did a couple of different versions of it. We did the filming. That famous sweatshirt that I'm wearing in the fact video, that comes from just the back room. Like literally, we didn't have a hoodie. And I said, it'd be really funny if we had like an Eminem style hoodie. Do we have anything over here? And our staff just went in the back and pulled up

the sweatshirt, and so that's what I'm wearing in the video. Tom and Noah do an amazing job. Noah particularly is an incredibly good director. She really is talented at cutting all this stuff together. So the final result is fact. And when that is released, that jumps to the top of the hip hop chart.

the rap charts on Apple and then stays there and ends up charting on the Billboard 100, ends up being number one in a couple of sections of the Billboard 100, which is just hysterically funny because obviously when my parents were paying for my violin lesson so I could become a quasi-virtuosic violinist as a teenager, obviously what they were thinking is that one day I would talk into a microphone

to a meter, and that somehow that would become my big musical hit. So Facts ends up charting. That's all in the course of the same week. That same month, we also went down to the southern border to film an episode of Divided States of Biden. This was an amazing experience. We went down to a Native American reservation that's right on the border of Mexico in Arizona and rode along with Brandon Judd, who is the newly selected ambassador to Chile under President Trump, head of the National Border Patrol Officers Union. And he and I did a ride-along. We went all the way along

maybe 20 miles of the border. So very few Border Patrol agents. If you want to see a full explanation of exactly how bad Joe Biden's border policy was on the southern border, take a look at that episode of Divided States of Biden. I think that it was a kind of shocking experience.

frankly. To watch Mexican drug cartel drones flying above the American border was a reminder that we have lost sovereignty under Joe Biden. Okay, fast forward a few weeks and we actually flew over to New Jersey, to Camden, New Jersey to take a look at the fentanyl crisis because we wanted to do an episode of Divided States of Biden on the fentanyl crisis. And...

It was a shocking experience, truly shocking. I mean, that place is a third world country. The cops don't have control over the situation. They've been deprived of control over the situation. We're talking open air drug markets, people shooting heroin into their feet just on the street.

And then we decided that we wanted to see something even worse. So we drove across the bridge into Pennsylvania. We went over to the Kensington section of Philadelphia. And that area is, I think, the worst place I've seen in America, truthfully. I've been to a lot of unpleasant places in America. Hell, I used to live in Los Angeles. I used to drive through places in East LA, really impoverished places. Kensington is something totally different. It was a zombie apocalypse. And then, of course, we spoke with people whose children had been killed by fentanyl, who were poisoned by fentanyl.

This tied into a lot of the border discussion, obviously, but that was deeply affecting to see our fellow Americans under the influence of drugs that legitimately murder them, wreck their lives, in some cases rot their flesh, and truly kill

egregious and horrifying stuff. We'll get to more on this in a moment. First, as social unrest escalates and crime rates climb, securing the safety of your family is more crucial than ever. Now, listen, I love the Second Amendment, but the thought of using lethal force, not ideal for everybody. That's why you need to check out Burna. And the fact is that, God forbid, you're in your home. Here's

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The Burna is a safer, more sensible alternative that could potentially save lives on both sides, protecting both user and aggressor. Thanks to Burna for sponsoring this video. In March, I actually held a fundraiser, co-sponsored a fundraiser for President Trump over at the Trump Doral. It was a terrific event. President Trump is hilarious. I will admit that he's unbelievably charming in person, truly. Like, he's great. As a retail politician, he's amazing. I've talked about it before, but he comes into the room, he's like, Ben Shapiro, Ben Shapiro, used to love Rhonda Sanctus, now you're gonna love us so much more.

What can you say about the guy? I mean, like, Donald Trump is the same in every situation, and he is, in fact, a hysterically funny human being. In April, we had the opportunity to sit down with RFK Jr. A great conversation. You can check out the full conversation on the Sunday special. He's a fascinating person, obviously. He's now the nominee to lead Health and Human Services. I think my favorite part about the conversation, number one, RFK likes to talk about things that nobody else was talking about. That's sort of the appeal of RFK, the make America healthy again thing.

really is a thing. I mean, it's something that people don't spend a lot of time thinking about, but as soon as he says it, you realize that it's true, that Americans are obese, that they're overweight, that they are out of shape, and that the government actually has something to do with that because of the standard set by places like the FDA and places like the Department of Agriculture.

Also in April, we had a conversation with Javier Mille, the president of Argentina, an amazing person, a person who's leading an economic revolution that I think is going to sweep across the West. It was an amazing conversation. He is just a fascinating human being. Fast forward a few months, and one of the big controversies brewing in the United States, a controversy

a controversy that we helped to uncover, was the censorious coterie of advertisers working along with social media in order to prevent any advertising from appearing on conservative shows. One of the signal influences here was the so-called organization GARM, the Global Alliance for Responsible Media. And we had led the way on reporting on this over at The Daily Wire. There was a congressional investigation going on into the influence of malign actors like GARM, putting together sort of false standards

of advertizable material. And so I went and testified before Congress

in July, and that had some particularly relevant effects. One of the effects was that my testimony on Garm, I think, helped provoke Elon Musk into suing Garm. We, of course, were also going to sue Garm, and Garm, instead of taking the lawsuit, disbanded. So the entire censorious regime just fell apart with the flick of a finger, essentially, because we helped expose what was going on with this, again, coterie of advertisers and advertising agencies that basically decided to deprive half the political aisle of all

advertising revenue. The other thing that happened during that hearing was a pretty famous back and forth that I had with Eric Swalwell, the congressperson from California. For some reason, Eric thought that it would be an excellent idea to question me about my prior views on social policy and also to say some weird things about Project 2025. How about banning the abortion pill? That's part of Project 2025. Do you support that part? I think that that's a state-by-state issue on a personal level. I'm just asking you. I'm

Sure. I'm a fully pro-life person, which means that I'm not in favor of the distribution of the abortion pill. And just because we found some receipts, you did say, I think homosexual activity is a sin. Yes, I'm religious to you. That's true. Are you sure there's a genetic component? You found me out. But the view of all religious people I know has always been that sexual behavior is something that is up to you. And you said, I may have a desire to sleep with many women, but I do not. I agree with me. Yes, that's true. Congratulations on your, yeah, uh...

I'm sure it's very hard to restrain yourself. It didn't go amazing for Eric. The same week as the Garm hearing in Washington, D.C., I then traveled from D.C. to Los Angeles. And in Los Angeles, I sat down with Bill Maher and Bakari Sellers to talk about everything ranging from race in politics to the presidential election. It was pretty fascinating. There were a few viral moments. Where?

I'm just looking for it. Honestly, I'd like for the Democratic Party to pull its support from the pro-Khamas wing of the Democratic Party. That would be the way. Well, I actually think... I actually think that... Even as that started to go viral, it was a Saturday when my security came up to me and told me that somebody had attempted to shoot Donald Trump in the head and that it hit him in the ear. Unbelievable thing. I mean, God literally...

put his hand on Donald Trump's head and turned his head slightly. And by doing so, saved the country. Because can you imagine what would have happened if Donald Trump had actually been assassinated live on television in the middle of a race that he was winning? Can you imagine that? Our post-assassination attempt episode was our biggest episode of the year here at Daily Wire. In early July, there was the debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, an astonishing debate that we covered for Daily Wire over backstage, also covered it on the show. I mean, just amazing stuff. Unprecedented in American history. It basically caused the sitting president of the United States,

and the nominee for his party to drop out of the race entirely. By August, Joe Biden was out of the race. Kamala Harris had been swapped into place. And now we had a brand new race on our hands. In mid-July, the Republican National Convention happens. Donald Trump picks J.D. Vance. It is a blowout event. Stars studded, really well run. Then Trump gives a very, very long culminating speech, like a 93-minute speech. The Democrats hold their own convention in late August. And it's all Tim Walz. They're

Big controversy over Kamala Harris's selection of Tim Walz as her vice presidential candidate, as opposed to, for example, Josh Shapiro, the Jewish governor of Pennsylvania. The Democrats in the college campus wing of the Democratic Party weren't going to have a Jew for that. That was not a thing. Fast forward to September, there's a second assassination attempt against Donald Trump at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida. And it's an insane, insane election cycle, as we all know. And then October. October...

I do a series of campaign events with a series of Republican Senate candidates all over the country. Sam Brown in Nevada. Bernie Moreno, who ended up winning his race in Ohio. Tim Sheehy, who won his race in Montana. Eric Hovde, who ended up very, very, very narrowly losing his race in Wisconsin under, I think, kind of shadowy circumstances. Ted Cruz over in Texas. And Dave McCormick over in Pennsylvania. Both of those latter candidates ended up winning their Senate seats. Dave McCormick

His race in Pennsylvania was incredibly close, incredibly hard fought, and McCormick winning in Pennsylvania was a major blow to Democratic hopes to retain a majority. Early on in October, October 7th, I went with President Trump to New York to commemorate October 7th. I was invited by the Trump campaign, as well as by Chabad, to visit the Ohel, which is the grave of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson in New York. I brought along with me a family, the family of Edad Alexander, who is an American hostage being held by Hamas in captivity. I introduced the parents,

to President Trump. It was an amazing, moving experience. President Trump, again, is great with people. And I think that he was moved by the experience. It is devastating. Obviously, October 7th was devastating. The anniversary was devastating. Being with the family, the parents, and the brother of a person who is being held hostage by terrorists

incredibly difficult, but I think a key moment, I think, actually, in the campaign, because it demonstrated full scale that Donald Trump was going to change policy on the Middle East when he came into power. A couple of weeks later, I had the ability to have President Trump on the show for the very first time. Terrific interview. Again, President Trump is a very winning personality. I had no wars. Think of it. And I'm talking about in the world. The world was at peace. I did the Abraham Accords, which

should have been filled in. I would add every one of the slots filled in. Biden got none. We had the four countries and four very good ones and four tough ones. And the rest was just a fill in job. It would have taken place. We would have total peace. And I made the statement because, as you know, Iran was broke.

We had no terrorism. We had no attacks. We had no Hamas problems, no Hezbollah problems. We had nothing because Iran didn't have the money to give to them because I put sanctions on and I dealt directly. That interview went pretty viral, as well it should have. I also did a debate on Jubilee. This one went viral. This was a...

strange sort of format. It was me versus 25 Democrats. All of them would get up. It was a very weird circumstance. Not my first rodeo. Obviously, you can go all the way back to 2014 when I'm being yelled at by Zoe Turr, but, you know, always good to play the oldies. Oh, there are a bunch of crazy things that got said on Jubilee. First, there was the verbal abuse at the hands of the very angry trans man.

who for some reason thought that yelling me for six minutes would make her feel better, it appears that that was not in fact the case. There was somebody who tried to make the case that abortion includes just having a baby, which is a very strange case to make. Would you not assume something like a C-section would be considered an abortion? No, because the baby is born alive. So how would that be an abortion? Why would, what does the definition of abortion have to include the death of a fetus? Because that's literally the definition of abortion. It literally isn't though. There were people who tried to argue

that diversity, equity, and inclusion was actually something like the Electoral College, which is, again, a very weird thing to say. I think that Trump won 2016 because of a modality of DEI. Essentially, what I'd say is the Electoral College, right, strives for inclusion of smaller states with lower populations by over-representing them in the overall vote. Also, that same week,

sat down with the free press and did a debate with Sam Harris on the election. Sam took the anti-Trump position. I took the pro-Trump position. This debate also went viral. I think it was a good explication of the two positions. As I said at the time, that debate was really between a pro-Trump, anti-Harris position, that'd be me, and an anti-Trump, no pro-Harris position from Sam Harris. There's a double standard here in the way partisans think about, partisans for Trump, think about what he says and bracket everything he says as just

political theater, I think we lose sight of just how not normal Trump is as a candidate. I think, Ben, if I had told you 10 years ago that you would one day support a presidential candidate who bragged about owning a teen beauty pageant so that he could barge into the dressing room and ogle naked underage girls, right?

I don't think you would believe me. No one can defend Kamala Harris, which ended up being a big problem for her. October was also the premiere of Am I Racist? from Matt Wolfe. Where are you guys on your anti-racist journeys? Ha ha ha ha!

So I'll look around the room and point to who we believe is the most racist person in the room. So I went over to the premiere of Am I Racist up in Nashville and obviously watched in astonishment and joy as Am I Racist charted and just dominated the box office, the highest earning documentary of the last decade. A couple of weeks later, went back to Los Angeles and ended up going on Bill Maher's Club Random podcast, which...

Was entertaining. Bill's a really entertaining person. Really interesting guy. I bet you you had your day when you were like a wild... No. Not high school? Not even a moment, no. Really not even a moment? Not even a moment. You've always been... I'm as straight-laced as it is possible to be. Just a few days after that was election night. Trump's big victory. A blowout backstage...

in which jelly beans were eaten, drinks were served, and in which I may or may not have allowed myself to feel extraordinary measures of joy. The vibe shift throughout the evening for me, I think, was one of the viral elements of that particular broadcast. Did things cool down in December? Not on your life, they didn't. The Trump administration immediately started putting into place a wide variety of nominees, many of whom are just

Terrific. Went over to Washington, D.C., have sat with senators, congresspeople talking about what the future of the Trump administration is going to look like. And then I traveled to Israel for a couple of weeks, met with some of the politicians over there, premiered a musical with my father, actually, over in Israel. He and I wrote a musical. He wrote the music and the lyrics. I wrote the libretto to a musical about the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. It had an October 7th tie-in. Then came back and immediately went to Argentina and spoke at CPAC.

in Argentina, in Buenos Aires, talking about the power of free markets versus socialism. Had the opportunity to meet with President Millet at that point as well. And again, President Millet is transforming the nature of how economics is seen in the West. It's an amazing, amazing thing and part of a broader movement toward conservatism across the world. So it's been a bit of a year.

A lot of things happened this year. And next year, I don't see it slowing down like at all. January is going to be nuts. We're going to inaugurate a new president. We're going to have congressional hearings. I have some big plans I can't tell you about yet. There's all sorts of great stuff coming in the new year. So if you thought 2024 was busy, just wait until 2025.

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