EXCLUSIVE: The Federalist’s Mollie Hemingway Has Some Tough Medicine for Conservatives on Election Integrity

Depending on who you are, Mollie Hemingway might be best known for her regular appearances on Fox News All-Star Panel on “Special Report,” or perhaps you know her as the senior editor of the conservative publication, The Federalist. Or maybe her incredible 2021 book, Rigged: How the Media, Big Tech, and the Democrats Seized Our Elections.

That last being even more incredible thanks to Elon Musk ripping the cloak of Big Tech censorship wide open.

Recently she took time to speak to the Clare Boothe Luce Center for Conservative Women in Virginia, touching specifically on how conservatives should approach election integrity in the future.

The mission of the Clare Boothe Luce Center for Conservative Women is to “prepare women for effective leadership and promote leading conservative women,” which makes Ms. Hemingway an ideal speaker for the organization.

Ms. Hemingway took some moments to sit with me for a one-on-one interview to discuss the truth about Big Tech/Deep State censorship, the new landscape created by COVID voting rules, and how independent journalism has allowed for increased public debate.

Our conversation was not only educational, but also filled with valuable common sense analysis not seen in mainstream media.

The Threat Of Debate

If you haven’t been following the Twitter Files, please do so, even if you don’t use Twitter.

As I’ve mentioned before, not being on Twitter does not mean that what happens on Twitter doesn’t affect your life. Very, very much the opposite.

The sad truth is much of what is decided as newsworthy by major outlets, and much of what is focused on by the federal government is dictated within the Twitterverse, so understanding just how easily corrupted social media – and thus mainstream media – has become over the last few years is critical to understand what content you are being fed in your nightly news.

As Mollie pointed out in our interview:

“The release of the Twitter Files shows the extent to which control of the press is a major goal of the left.”

To understand what she means, it’s essential first to go back and remember how the news was accumulated and delivered to the American public.

Mollie explains:

“Decades ago, there were far fewer outlets, and they all would kind of adopt a particular party line.”

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I’m old enough to remember when CNN was the go-to for 24/7 news coverage. Even before then, I remember the family tradition of watching Peter Jennings on “ABC World News Tonight” and “60 Minutes” with Andy Rooney.

Nowadays, things are much different; thanks in large part to the internet, there has been, as Mollie put it, an “explosion” of independent media outlets, which in turn has started:

“…interesting, vibrant debates in the culture, and that’s threatening to a lot of the people in the establishment.”

So what can we do? In a nutshell, independent journalists must keep doing what we’ve always been doing, reporting the truth and shining a light on important topics that the mainstream chooses to ignore.

But that only goes so far, as we now know. Whereas the deep state had a relatively easy time capturing the then-few media outlets, you might think that many, many outlets would be harder to control. 

Not so, now that they seek to control the distribution outlets – ie Twitter, Facebook, etc. 

Lying Beneath The Surface

Americans, regardless of political flavor, are generally universally concerned about a lot of the same big-name issues; rising crime, the economy, illegal immigration, and of course, election integrity. But more often than we’d like, it’s the issues festering beneath the surface, only to rear their ugly heads in the news cycle inevitably, that are just as important.

Take, for instance, the baby formula shortage and deep state entanglement with Big Tech.

So I was curious if Mollie had any thoughts on issues that conservatives and, in general, Americans might be overlooking that could become significant news events in the coming year.

The first issue Mollie mused on was how, even with the federal government at a stalemate, state governments are starting to show signs of involvement in fighting back against government overreach.

Her explanation of this overreach expertly explains the underlying threat to our democracy:

“We have gone from a constitutional republic into an administrative state where we’re having this branch of government that’s not really constitutionalized.”

She used Florida’s Governor Ron DeSantis as an example of how a state has decided to push back against the D.C. regulatory bureaucracy, hoping we will see that spread to other states.

Another area she believes might receive increased coverage is one we’ve touched on a lot; she wonders if:

“…we’re reaching a breaking point with the social movements that are all about hating yourself and your country. People are starting to see what the fruit of not teaching people the founding principles and love of country has brought, and they do not like it.”

With recent surveys showing children are becoming indifferent to the American Flag and military academy cadets being taught to acknowledge their white privilege, it’s hard to understand how this hasn’t already reached a boiling point.

RELATED: Stanford University Declares Calling Yourself ‘American’ is Offensive

Play The Game To Win The Game

Of course, Mollie took some time to chat with me about the topic of the day, election integrity. Like myself, Mollie firmly believes that the best way to conduct an election is to go in person and vote on election day.

I spent almost every election while I was in the military having to submit an absentee ballot, so this year I was proud to go and cast my vote in person. However, many argue that perhaps the Republican Party needs to embrace the idea of early voting and the ballot harvesting Democrats have become expert at, and Mollie’s take on the argument is thought-provoking, to say the least. 

Essentially if we want to win the game, we must learn to play the game. Again, using a sports analogy, she gave a great example from a friend.

Say you play in a league that allows for performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs). You may rightly be opposed to the practice, leaving you two options: stand your ground and don’t take the PEDs and never play, or take the PEDs and fight to make the game fairer. 

In her event speech, she used Florida as an excellent example of how this can work in actual life practice. While we all should remember the 2000 election debacle in Florida, many don’t know that since that embarrassment, the state has worked every year to improve its election laws making, as Mollie put it, “significant incremental improvements” to their election system.

And while early voting isn’t something Mollie or most of us prefer, the GOP in Florida proved this past midterm that they could make it work to their advantage just as the Democrats do but legally.

By tracking ballots and not just votes, and putting laws in place to deter election fraud, the Florida GOP was able to handily administer their election results efficiently, effectively, and with a rather large margin of success over the Democrats.

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The Takeaway

Mollie’s speech at the Center for Conservative Women brought so many participants that the house was packed, with many standing in the back to hear what she had to say.

Of course, not everyone agreed with everything Ms. Hemingway delivered, including me. Still, one this is for sure…it sparked vibrant debate, something this country desperately needs.

Having hard conversations civilly is key to growth in any system, be it a family, business, or nation. Last week we saw Republicans debate and negotiate ways to make our government work more for the people and less for the politicians. 

The whole time, mainstream media quickly judged the event as everything from disarray to terrorism in some cases. But as Mollie explained, debate is healthy and good, and if the establishment is afraid of it, then it’s probably a good thing.

We will keep up the vibrant debate, exposing the truth and reporting on stories ignored by others. Your charge, dear reader, is to keep reading, asking questions, and debating.