The Drill Down with Peter Schweizer

They caught $200 billion in fraud — now Congress wants to take away the tools that found it. Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers are joined by fraud investigator Andy McClanahan to expose a buried amendment that would ban federal agencies from buying the data they use to hunt criminal fraud networks. Critics call it the "digital defunding of the police." Plus: a $14B Russian Medicare bust, the IRS keeping your biometrics while fraud cops get cut off, and Washington State chaos — a ballot box that exploded, 360 blank ballots in a dumpster, and voter cards where 92% of names were Chinese. Take away the data, and investigators go back to a notepad and pencil. Here's who benefits. Subscribe at TheDrillDown.com

As America approaches its 250th birthday, the media insists we're hopelessly divided and on the brink of a second Civil War. Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers ask the question nobody in Washington wants answered: is that actually true — or is someone profiting from making you believe it? In this episode, Peter and Eric dig into the leaked DNC "autopsy" of the 2024 election — a 152-page report so damning that DNC chair Ken Martin tried to bury it before releasing it anyway. Wait until you hear what its "conclusion" section actually says. Plus: why Trump now owns the Republican Party outright, why the Democrats' biggest names can't win back rural America, and the foreign adversaries quietly funding the chaos.

With important mid-term elections coming in November, “the latest rage in politics is cracking and packing,” says Peter Schweizer. “Gerrymandering is in the news right now,” says co-host Eric Eggers on the most recent episode of The Drill Down. “Cracking is when you spread out your opposition's voters into different districts. Packing is the reverse of that – when you pack your opponent's voters into a single district.” They discuss the long history of politicians trying to choose their own voters.

How Mexican Consulates Are Engaged in Political Interference in the US

Whether it is interfering with airline mergers, off-shoring a state’s oil refineries to Asia, or placing bets on chip makers, the nine scariest words in English are, in President Ronald Reagan’s immortal phrase, “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.” The fall of Spirit Airlines “is the classic Democratic problem,” says author and investigative journalist Peter Schweizer. “They don’t understand the implications of their decisions, the costs and repercussions that affect real people’s lives.” On the most recent episode of The Drill Down podcast, Schweizer and co-host Eric Eggers tie a neat bow around Spirit Airlines, California oil refineries, and chip-maker Intel Corp.

The shots that rang through the ballroom at the Washington Hilton last week bounced off the same walls as when President Ronald Reagan was shot and nearly killed 45 years ago. But the reaction to the two events says how much our culture has degraded. In 1981, the Academy Awards were postponed for 24 hours. When emcee Johnny Carson opened the broadcast by wishing Reagan well in his recovery, there was thunderous applause from the Hollywood audience. All those years later, two days before the attempt, liberal talk show host Jimmy Kimmel made a joke about the First Lady having the “glow of an expectant widow,” which he later defended as a joke aimed at her age difference to the president. Some prominent Democratic influencers on Bluesky began peddling a theory that the whole incident was somehow “staged.”

How California’s ‘Stop Nick Shirley’ Law Threatens Investigative Journalism

Rep. Eric Swalwell’s sudden political death was no accident, but a strategic hit job by an unethical California Democratic Party and its media enablers. “Swalwell was pushed out for strategic purposes,” says investigative journalist Peter Schweizer. Call it the law of the jungle. On the Drill Down podcast, Schweizer and co-host Eric Eggers review the body count and identify which ethically challenged members will be next to go.

Foreign interference in our elections is the broad theme on today’s episode of The Drill Down, as hosts Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers discuss birthright citizenship at the Supreme Court, ActBlue’s foreign donor problem, and a lawsuit in Virginia over allowing the foreign-born children of people who once lived in Virginia to vote in the state’s elections.

The Supreme Court looks ready to overturn a Mississippi law that allows absentee ballots to be collected as late as five days after the election. Meanwhile, Congress is struggling to consider a bill called the SAVE Act that would require proof of citizenship to register to vote in all states and require voters to show a photo ID to vote. On the most recent episode of The Drill Down podcast, host Peter Schweizer asks “will either of these issues determine the outcome of November’s elections?”

Are there administration insiders profiting from knowing news about the war with Iran before the public does? Recent news stories from the world of “prediction markets” seem to indicate that may in fact be happening. That story and an interview with the author of a new book that details a barbaric crime by the Communist Chinese.

Elon Musk calls artificial intelligence “a supersonic tsunami headed toward humanity.” The CEO of Anthropic says we have about five years until half of all entry-level, white-collar jobs will be wiped out. Microsoft’s head of AI believes it will happen sooner than that. The hype around artificial intelligence (AI) is so thick and constant that people are fatigued by it. Unfortunately, though, that fatigue will allow bad actors to dominate the race to AI dominance, which would be a very bad thing. More than the quick answers AI can give us now, who controls the inputs it will use to provide those answers matters far more. That important question is the subject of a brand-new book, who speaks with host Eric Eggers on the most recent episode of The DrillDown.

“Birth Tourism” is a major national security threat, with as many as 1.5 million Chinese children who were born as “birthright” US citizens potentially becoming voters in US elections, author Peter Schweizer told a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday. Sitting on a panel with three constitutional lawyers and a US Marine, Schweizer told senators that China has created an “industrial scale” way of creating American citizens who are born in the US and quickly whisked back to China where they are raised and indoctrinated in the Chinese Communist Party’s ways. He cited Chinese government and academic estimates that between 50,000 and 100,000 Chinese have been on US soil since 2013, meaning they are only a few years away from being old enough to vote.

How Trump's Iran Strike Reshapes Global Power Dynamics

Words like “mind control” and “brainwashing” get tossed around, but it is a very real science and a very dangerous game that former CIA operative and now conservative talk show host Buck Sexton calls by its scientific name of “menticide,” the murder of the mind. Psychological attacks are real, and the concept of menticide dates to a Dutch psychologist who studied how totalitarian governments control the thoughts of their populations. Joost Meerloo witnessed and studied the way Josef Stalin, Vladimir Lenin, and Mao Zedong used the insights from Pavlov’s experiments on dogs against people. His most famous work is called The Rape of the Mind.

Did politics destroy journalism, or was it the other way around? Author and investigative journalist Peter Schweizer, host of The Drill Down, sees the case for both but believes journalism has done more damage to itself than politicians could manage to do to them. Schweizer says, “a friend of mine who used to be a producer on 60 Minutes said he thought that journalists became less interested in actual hard news coverage.” On the latest episode of the Drill Down podcast, his guest Mark Halperin, who had a front row seat to see it happening, agrees.

Bad Bunny

In the week since The Invisible Coup: How American Elites and Foreign Powers Use Immigration as a Weapon. debuted atop the bestseller lists, Mexico’s president and ambassador to the US have tried to dismiss the book’s findings about Mexican consulates interfering in US domestic politics, waving off multiple quotes from numerous Mexican politicians and consular officials themselves. In a statement released by her office, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said, “I categorically deny any involvement or attempt by Mexico to interfere in the internal affairs of the United States.” Schweizer has already been asked to testify at a Senate hearing in March on several of The Invisible Coup’s most eye-popping revelations. On the most recent episode of The Drill Down, Schweizer responds to the Mexican government’s denials.

In its first week, Peter Schweizer’s new book, The Invisible Coup, is the number one book in the country. A little celebration might be in order, but Schweizer and co-host Eric Eggers relate the book’s blockbuster revelations to what is happening now in Minneapolis. Why is ICE even there in the first place? The Department of Homeland Security said  its largest immigration enforcement operation ever, called “Operation Metro Surge,” was tied in part to allegations of fraud involving Somali residents, which The DrillDown has discussed previously. Massive defrauding of aid programs including daycare, food, housing, and ambulance services was perpetrated largely by Somalis living in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.

The Invisible Coup - Weaponized Migration in America

To respond to “affordability issues,” the Trump administration floated 50-year mortgages for buying homes. Last week, Donald Trump suggested capping credit card interest rates at 10 percent. Financial writer and two-time New York Times bestselling author Carol Roth thinks both are a “terrible idea.” She joins The Drill Down to discuss good financial sense.

The story of welfare fraud in Minnesota keeps getting bigger. And no one in state government has worked harder and longer trying to sound the alarm about it than state Sen. Steve Drazkowski. He joins The Drill Down to discuss the growing evidence of widespread fraud in his state that may include not only welfare and child care fraud but vote fraud as well. Minn. Gov. Tim Walz, who was the Democrats’ vice-presidential nominee in 2024, just abandoned his bid for a third term in the wake of the growing scandal, which exposed potentially billions of dollars in fraud committed mostly by Somalis in the Minneapolis area through fake feeding programs, daycare centers, and other social programs. Reporters have also identified political contributions to many of the state’s most prominent politicians from Somali immigrants who have been implicated and/or prosecuted in the scams.

2025 Highlights

Massive welfare fraud in Minnesota by Somali immigrants was not supposed to happen because of government “guardrails.” Political violence by an Afghan refugee was not supposed to happen because such people were vetted before being allowed into the US. And voter fraud won’t be a problem because there are safeguards to prevent it. Those three separate issues all prompt us to ask… What happens when those “guardrails” are missing, the “vetting” is left undone, or the “safeguards” ignored?

Legal or Illegal - The Debate on Military Strikes

Unmasking Welfare Fraud -The Minnesota Scandal and Its Implications

Thanksgiving Politics - A Family Affair

Unpacking the Arctic Frost Investigation Political Scandal

It’s harder than ever to buy a home, thanks to immigration, environmental regulations, and zoning restrictions. The word “crisis” gets used too often, but housing certainly qualifies. On the heels of an election won by Democrats who stressed “affordability,” the Trump administration has floated the idea of introducing 50-year mortgages to lower the entry cost of buying a home. Is that a good idea?

During the government shutdown, Agriculture Secretary Brook Rollins has been reviewing data from 29 states administering the food stamp program. Rollins’s review has found EBT cards that have been carrying balances of more than $10,000. It found cards that haven’t been used in years. It found cards issued to people who never existed. Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), as food stamps are formally known, has been around since the 1930s but ballooned during the Biden administration years and now serves 42 million people in the US, one-eighth of the population. What’s happening? Is the program running efficiently and properly? Will the shutdown really “starve children” as the Trump administration’s critics are charging?Joining host Eric Eggers on The Drill Down podcast is returning guest Andrew McClenahan from the United Council on Welfare Fraud. McClenahan’s organization represents state-level investigators of welfare fraud. And it turns out there is a lot of it to investigate.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk and other killings by young and seemingly well-educated but radicalized young people has led many to ask: Why does this keep happening? The problems begin not in college, but in the K-12 schooling that is infested with a mind-altering system of control. It is called “social emotional learning” (SEL), and a new book by Priscilla West warns that it will take decades to undo the damage it has done to childhood education.

Voting security is always a hot topic around election time, but manipulation of our electoral system is a bigger problem that we have to worry about all the time. On the most recent episode of The Drill Down podcast, we are not talking about stolen ballots, “ballot harvesting,” or other shenanigans that can happen during an election, but about how congressional districts are both drawn and apportioned. Two things recently in the news raise questions about how we do those things, and whether it’s still the best way.

Riot Inc - The Hidden Networks Fueling Unrest

The federal government remains in a shutdown and, depending on whom you believe, it is either because Democrats want to give free healthcare to illegal immigrants, or Republicans want to jack up costs on ordinary Americans. What’s going on, and who’s right?

The indictment of former FBI Director James Comey has raised cries of “lawfare” from Democrats declaring that President Donald Trump’s administration is going after his political opponents.It’s a rich charge to make, given the number of prosecutions against both Trump and those in his orbit during and following his first term. One of those targeted during the first Trump terms, Steve Bannon, joins The Drill Down podcast on the most recent episode.

The TikTok Dilemma - A Deal in the Making

“Evil is on the rise in America, and overseas,” says author and talk show host Bill O’Reilly. “Evil is very simple: It's when one human being hurts another human being on purpose with no remorse.” Like Charlie Kirk’s killer. Like Vladimir Putin. And about 15 percent of the world’s population, O’Reilly thinks.

The NFL's Hidden Agenda - Wokeness or Profit

Is George Soros a racketeer? The billionaire currency speculator, who in 1992 netted $1 billion by shorting the British pound and bringing the Bank of England to its knees, controls a large network of leftwing activist organizations from under the umbrella of his Open Society Foundations.  Days ago, President Donald Trump threatened Soros and his son, Alex, with prosecution under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, a 1970 law providing for extended criminal penalties against participants in ongoing criminal organizations. The law was meant to be a weapon for prosecutors against the Mafia, but it has been used in other contexts as well. Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers discuss.

The National Guard's Role in Crime Control

It’s the heat of the Summer in Washington DC, but hell is freezing over anyway.Why? Because veteran stock market wizard Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), has come out in support of a bill that will ban members of Congress from trading in stocks or options. For late arrivals, former House Speaker Pelosi has for more than a decade been the poster child for members of Congress who became rich by trading on inside information to predict the movement of the stock market. Pelosi has long tried to deflect criticism by saying that her husband makes all the stock moves, but the numbers don’t lie: While the S&P index is up by 240 percent over the last 10 years, Pelosi and her husband are up an eye-popping 745 percent.

On Power with Mark Levin

Experts are on a run of bad luck lately. Climate change predictions, Covid vaccine promises, jobs statistics, and economic analysis of the effect of the Trump administration’s tariffs.What’s the problem with the experts? Do they really know what they say they know? Do they know how much they don’t know? On their most recent podcast episode, Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers of The Drill Down take the experts out to the woodshed.

Margaret Roberts - FBI's Role in Domestic Terrorism

Legislative Priorities on Capitol Hill Post-Major Bill Passage With Congressman Wesley Hunt

Marking the first anniversary of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump in Butler, Pa., the US Senate released two reports on failures by the Secret Service failures both during and prior to the attempt. The level of incompetence shown in the reports has caused some to wonder whether Secret Service was really even trying to prevent it.

Whatever the truth may be about Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide or “client list,” he was engaged in the business of human trafficking and that leaves a paper trail. As Peter Schweizer noted on the most recent episode of The Drill Down podcast, Investment bank JP Morgan Chase turned over the records it had, worth over 1 billion dollars, to the federal government in 2019. Why haven’t those records been released? “We have more than $1 billion were used for purposes of human trafficking,” JP Morgan wrote to the Justice Department after Epstein’s death, Schweizer says. As Eric Eggers notes, we “follow the money.” So, why has no one else been investigated in light of JP Morgan’s disclosures?

Jason Chaffetz - How Deep State Spies, NGOs, and Woke Corporations Plan to Push You Out of the Economy

President Donald Trump just blew up Iran’s nuclear program. That was the easy part. What Trump has done in arranging a tenuous ceasefire between Iran and Israel, after hammering the table with 14 MOPs dropped on Iran’s most critical underground nuclear enrichment plants, is “a return to 19th Century Great Power projection,” says author and investigative reporter Peter Schweizer on the most recent episode of The Drill Down podcast. Co-host Eric Eggers adds, “the rizz is back.”

No Kings? No problem. The weekend protests called “No Kings” produced crowds of a few thousand in some reliably “blue” cities like Portland, Boston, Seattle, and others, but not much else. Tragically, though, a killer who was once a political appointee of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz shot and killed the former state House speaker and her husband and seriously wounded a state senator and his wife – and killed his dog – in an act of politically motivated violence. On the latest episode of The Drill Down, co-hosts Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers look at the protest campaign and follow the money behind it.