Jordan Klepper’s “Red Flags” Special, Shot in 4 States, Airs Tonight a Week Before the Midterms

I love my freedom too much.

That was one voter’s answer when Jordan Klepper asked him to define the communism he said was on the ballot, in the opening clip of Klepper’s new Comedy Central special, Red Flags. Another voter in the same clip said he probably couldn’t give a definition at all. The clip ran Monday on MS NOW’s Morning Joe, eight days before the midterms.

Everyone running the clip is running the laugh. Nobody has checked the answers voters gave against the public record, so we did it for two of them. Both come out worse for the people on camera than the edit does.

Checking the Tape

Asked what “biblical grounds” meant in Ken Paxton’s divorce, one Texas voter guessed taking the Lord’s name in vain or a corruption indictment. Angela Paxton’s July 2025 filing accuses him of adultery, which is how Texas Monthly says the phrase is usually read, and it is a public record the voter had not looked up. Paxton is the Republican Senate nominee in Texas, and the voter was backing him anyway.

The second claim came from the studio. The hosts said their own call to the NCAA found zero transgender athletes competing. We could not confirm that. What is on the record is that NCAA president Charlie Baker told a Senate panel in December 2024 he knew of fewer than 10 among about 510,000 athletes. Ten in 510,000 is roughly 1 in 51,000, or 0.002 percent. That is the “crisis” the rally crowds are being asked to be angry about.

Our read is that the voters are not the red flag. The campaign is. Republicans gave these voters a scary word, communism, and no definition to go with it, because a definition would show nothing on the ballot fits. They are also asking Texans to vote for a man his own former supporters call a “crook” in a New York Times focus group of 2024 Trump voters. Klepper’s own count is four states, Nebraska, Ohio, Texas and Florida. The pattern in the tape is the same in each: fear first, facts never.