Guy Benson, Fox News Analyst and KCMO Talk Radio Host | 4-22-26

0:00Guy Benson's here on KCMO. We got a lot to talk to him about. Of course, you hear him every afternoon, two to five on 95, seven FM. Of course, a political analyst as well for Fox News on the TV side. He's a Virginia resident. So we'll get to all the chaos that happened there last night. But guy, you know, you're, you're on a gut felt show once in a while. What should Kansas City and expect with Greg coming to town here in a couple of weekends? Oh, man. Yeah, it's, it's a wild experience beyond that TV show. Usually, usually once a month, sometimes a little off and I'll be more often I'll be on this. You never quite know what to expect. What he might throw at you at the last minute, how he might introduce you in front of millions of people. He usually, I think for the live audience shows around the country, he usually goes with Thomas Shaloo, who is just a fantastic, wonderful, funny guy. So yeah, that, that'll be, that'll be great. So congratulations to Kelsey. Yes, everyone else is going. Yes, Tom Shaloo will be here as well. All right,

1:01last night in Virginia, point and a half was the margin of victory for the yes side redistricting your home state or your state that you currently reside in from a six five Democrat to 10 one Democrat. How surprised were you by how close this was or is this what you expected based on how things were trending over the final few days? You know, I was basically expecting this to be mid single digits. Kamala Harris carried Virginia by six points. Jay Jones are now attorney general who had said in text messages to Republicans that he wanted to kill Republicans and their children one by six points. So felt like that was kind of the ballpark that I was expecting. I didn't think that it would be a blowout like Abigail Spanberger, the governor, her election last year, she wanted by 15. I didn't think it would be that high. I thought there was a chance that it would

2:04be this close. And I thought there was also maybe like a one in five chance that the no side could actually win. And one thing that's I think really frustrating is given the margin that we ended up seeing, I think the no side absolutely could have won actually if there had been any sort of concerted effort, smart concerted effort by Republicans to even remotely attempt to come close to the spending and advertising blitz that the Democrats waged in this state and something I'll talk about later today on my show. You know, some of the recriminations on the conservative side, the Republican side are going to be pretty intense because I think this was a blown opportunity. The Democrats treated it like a really, really important moment to get four additional House seats. And the Republicans, you know, with a few exceptions, but largely the party in terms of spending and attention and any

3:04of that. We're like, yeah, well, good luck. And I do think that given the fact that this will end up being, you know, probably about half of Kamala's margin, the electorate moved dramatically to the right, not just compared to last year, but compared to 2024. There was there was a lot of movement already in that direction. And I think there was a very, very straightforward case that was not partisan at all. Like I think the more the Republicans fought this openly as Republicans, it might not have helped. But there was a nonpartisan case to make here, which was we all voted, including myself. We voted in 2020 in a regularly scheduled, high turnout presidential election to get rid of, to ban partisan gerrymandering and replace it with this independent commission, which then created popular districts that are like among the Ferris in the country. And this big scheme was a snap election to change the Constitution by a bear majority to return the power to politicians to do partisan gerrymandering

4:10for political reasons. That is a very unpopular position. I think there was a lot of persuasion that could have been done. There just wasn't nearly enough of it. And I saw probably hundreds of propaganda ads to vote yes over the course of month, starting with the Winter Olympics. I never saw one no ad on television in Virginia. Never one. Wow. So and to lose that, apparently some ads did run eventually. I never saw one. My good friend Mary Catherine Ham who lives here never saw one. I talked to someone yesterday who's very plugged into Virginia politics. He told me he saw two. And he estimated he saw probably 400 yes ad and literally two no ads. So I feel like this actually could have been one. And now we wouldn't be talking about a moral victory or putting our eggs in the basket of the Virginia Supreme Court to throw this thing out because they decided in their infinite wisdom to rule on whether this whole scheme

5:13was legal after the referendum happened. So I believe the case is being heard later this week. Lower courts had already ruled this to be illegal. I have the Democrats did it illegally. So you know, I'm not holding my breath on that front. But I've heard from people that there's a very strong case to throw this thing out. We shall see. But boy, it stings a bit to go from one of the fairest maps in the country to literally the least fair map in the country, the most gerrymandered map of the country. And the word that they use Pete to market the whole scheme was fairness for well and stuff. Yeah, it was guy Benson's here. He's on a two o'clock on KCMO. In the last couple of minutes, you kind of alluded to it there guy. But before I hit the bottom of the hour, the Republicans who, you know, some will say they started this with Texas mid district or, you know, mid cycle redistricting, Missouri squeezed out a Democrat seat here in Kansas City.

6:14But to your point, they should have seen the battle coming in some of these bluer states and they didn't spend the money. The RNC didn't spend a dollar. The spend was 32 million on the S side to eight million on the no side is what I saw. So how much blame did the Republicans deserve here in the final minute or so for not planning for this the last year or so? Yeah, I mean, they definitely deserve a fair amount of blame. I would say that New York actually went before Texas. Texas, you could at least have defended. I was up in the air on Texas, go either way. But California then swooped in and answered Texas five seats for five seats. There were a single seat here or there, as you mentioned. This one was a real escalation in Virginia, especially after Republicans in Indiana said, you know what? No, we're not doing this anymore. Let's de-escalate. Virginia said, we're going as aggressive as possible. And now we'll see what the Republicans do. There are some people saying, we're on to

7:15Santis and Florida is now going to fight back. I mean, we could be in a spiral here. And I'm not necessarily totally against that because I'm pretty mad about what the Democrats have done here. But whatever Republicans have to do, they've got to do it smartly. And it doesn't seem like that has been happening yet. Next role with Vernon Davis, the transformative journeys of athletes, artists, and entrepreneurs in general. Lights out, Sean, Mary. I want to be the biggest in the best when I do. And so whatever it takes, I'll get it done and business, everything else. All I do is know how to fight and earn what I want. My man, Malik asks, what actor, comedian would you want to collaborate with? Me, Jamie Foxley, Kevin Harry in the movie. We said it on Vernon Davis podcast. So we'll circle back. Do that. Yeah. It go to clear. Next role with Vernon Davis. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. Next role with Vernon Davis. I'm your host Vernon Davis. Okay, y'all, thank you. Thank you. That's my today. We have Dietrich Wise through my example on the field, off the field during gang day in practice. That was one way that I led because then it led to success. Next role isn't about what's next. It's about why they do it.

8:18My man, Bobbi Bones. Like I've had a lot of stuff happen, bad and good. And so I don't have any fear of mixing up. That's powerful, man. Next role with Vernon Davis. Follow and listen on your favorite platform.