Right-wing commentators Ben Shapiro and Tucker Carlson used their speeches at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest to take shots at each other, only further emphasizing the right’s growing divide on Israel, conspiracy theories, and Jeffrey Epstein.

In his speech Thursday, Shapiro called out Carlson, Candace Owens, Megyn Kelly, and Steve Bannon for being “frauds and grifters.”

“The conservative movement is in serious danger,” he said, claiming it was rife with “charlatans who claim to speak in the name of principle but actually traffic in conspiracism and dishonesty.”

“When Steve Bannon, for example, accuses his foreign policy opponents of loyalty to a foreign country, he’s not actually making an argument based in evidence,” Shapiro continued. “He’s simply maligning people that he disagrees with. Which is indeed par for the course, for a man who was once a PR flack for Jeffrey Epstein.”

The TPUSA crowd reacted with an “oooh.”

Shapiro: When Steve Bannon accuses his foreign-policy opponents of loyalty to a foreign country, he is not making an argument based in evidence but maligning people he disagrees with, which is indeed par for the course from a man who was a pr flack for Jeffrey Epstein. pic.twitter.com/WX6M4LpfRD

This attack on Bannon—the right-wing provocateur instrumental in getting Trump elected to his first term—elicited mixed reactions.

“Shapiro constantly defames Jews who hold liberal politics or who oppose Israel’s policies as not really Jewish,” Zaid Jilani wrote. “Good for the goose good for the gander.”

“Shapiro is slamming Bannon for his ties to Epstein, but is SILENT about Trump having ties to Epstein. The irony …” wrote another.

Shapiro moved on to attacking Tucker for his platforming of Candace Owens—who has pushed the theory that Charlie Kirk was murdered for his rejection of Israel and AIPAC—and Nick Fuentes, who is a Nazi.

“The people who refused to condemn Candace’s truly vicious attacks—and some of them are speaking here tonight—are guilty of cowardice,” Shapiro said, obviously referring to Carlson. “If you host a Hitler apologist, Nazi-loving, anti-American piece of refuse like Nick Fuentes … you ought to own it.”

Carlson was apparently laughing backstage during this.

“That guy is pompous,” he said, according to Politico. “Calls to deplatform at a Charlie Kirk event? That’s hilarious.”

Carlson addressed the crowd afterward, attacking the rampant Islamaphobia present in Shapiro’s pro-Israel wing of the movement. (Carlson has recently been accused of being anti-American for his ties to Qatar, his criticism of Israel, and his acknowledgment of its genocide in Palestine. He has also faced criticism for his platforming of neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes.)

“Most Americans have more in common with each other than they disagree on … and almost everyone is willing to tolerate a good-faith argument about how to get there,” he said. “Except a few. And they’re the ones running around calling everyone an antisemite.”

Tucker: Attacking millions of Americans because they're muslims, it's disgusting. And I'm a Christian. I know there's effort to claim I'm a secret jihadi. I'm not. You should not attack on those grounds. And you're seeing that from Republicans. What the hell are you doing? What… pic.twitter.com/v1MRybhkjI

“Attacking millions of Americans because they’re Muslims? It’s disgusting. And I’m a Christian!” he continued. “I’m not a Muslim, I know there’s a lot of effort to claim I’m a secret jihadi, I’m not.… What the hell are you doing? What you’re doing is trying to divide the country. All these fake race wars that they’re always promoting?”

Regardless of where you fall on this rift, it’s clear that there is no unified MAGA front right now, at least at the punditry level. People like Carlson are tired of Trump governing as a neocon while campaigning as a populist, continuing to fund endless wars for Israel, trying to do regime change in Venezuela, and spewing racism. Those like Shapiro have a more traditional view of the situation. Only time will tell whose voice is the loudest by 2028.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem thinks that the diversity immigrant visa program, commonly known as the green card lottery, was responsible for the Brown University shooting and is pausing the program.

Noem announced on X Thursday night, “At President Trump’s direction, I am immediately directing USCIS to pause the DV1 program to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous program.”

The suspect of the Brown University and MIT shootings was identified Thursday as Claudio Manuel Neves Valente. According to Noem, Valente, 48, was a Portuguese national and former Brown University student who entered the country through the program in 2017. He was found dead Thursday at a storage facility in New Hampshire, apparently having committed suicide.

Targeting the entire visa program because of one crime is excessive, but fits into a Trump administration pattern of finding pretexts for drastic immigration restrictions. Much of it is based on racism, and comes from executive actions seeking to circumvent laws passed by Congress. Afghan immigrants, for example, are facing increased difficulty because of the shooting of two National Guard members last month.

It seems the Trump administration is going to make the Brown University shooting all about immigration instead of focusing on the crime itself, showing that xenophobia is paramount in its concerns.

The White House has finally been called out for fabricating its pharmaceutical savings—and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick did not handle it well.

For months, Donald Trump has seemingly grabbed numbers out of thin air to impress an ignorant public—or his sycophantic followers—on his allegedly great pharmaceutical deals, boasting that he has “cut drug prices by 1200, 1300, 1400, 1500 percent.”

The lie continued on Wednesday night, when Trump said during his national address he had negotiated to cut drug prices by “400, 500, and even 600 percent.”

But Fox News host John Roberts saw through the numerical gibberish, excoriating Lutnick during an interview Thursday and stressing that the math was simply “not possible.”

“Well, if you cut something by 100 percent the cost goes down to zero,” Roberts said. “If you cut it by 4-, 5-, 600 percent, the drug companies are actually paying you to take their product.

“So tell me, how much of last night’s speech was hyperbole and how much was fact?” the host asked.

But Lutnick’s reply didn’t make much sense, either.

“No, what he’s saying........

© New Republic