As more people join demonstrations to push back on President Trump’s immigration crackdown, tensions have been rising. Last week, 18 protesters were arrested after a confrontation with police, and one conservative talk show host was kicked in the back. But does that mean that overall, protests are getting more violent? KNUS’ Jeff Hunt has been attending protests in Denver all year, and he caught his own alleged assault on video.
City Cast Denver podcast host Bree Davies spoke with the conservative radio personality about the kick, his self-described “gotcha”-style videos, the question of violence, and why, through it all, he says he still loves Denver.
Below is a rough transcript of the interview, which you can listen to here.
Bree: Jeff Hunt. Welcome to City Cast Denver.
Jeff: Hi, Bree.
Bree: So you've been going to these anti-Trump protests all year in Denver, but on Tuesday night you had an experience that you captured on film that I'd love to hear from you about — can you just tell us what happened?
Jeff: Yeah. So, gosh, what did happen? I've been to, as you mentioned, a lot of protests. I spent four days with Palestinian protestors at the DNC in Chicago. So I'm used to being in tense situations. In fact, I love it because like, that's the, that's the point where our public policy's debated, like right there on the streets,
Bree: Face to face.
Jeff: Yeah, face to face, on the streets. I love being in the midst of those situations. I've never had a problem. Sometimes people get a little handsy, right? They'll kind of bump into you and try to push something or get a little edgier and I just walk away. I'm not there to get into big confrontations with people. I'm literally in the middle of filming myself in the street at 14th and Broadway where there was a little bit of a breakoff protest from the main anti-ICE protest.
So the main [protest] with microphones and all that stuff was right there at the Capitol. And then just at the edge, [at] 14th and Broadway, there was like, a little more kind of Antifa oriented counter protest that was going on. And so I go down there and I'm just kind of in the midst of talking to everybody and, and then I stop and I'm filming myself and I got kicked in the back, um, really hard, kind of like a sucker punch/sucker kick type of thing out of nowhere — [I’m] not talking to anybody, no tense confrontations, nothing like that. And it, and it hit me and jarred me.
You can see it in the video where I almost fall down and turn around and then pursue the guy to get him on camera. 'Cause I wanna get his face. And to get a sense of who this is, and then let 'em know that that's not right. Um, and whether you're somebody like me who's a conservative activist or a progressive, um, you have the freedom to be able to film in the streets and should be able to do so without fear of getting hit. So yeah, confronted him, got him on video.
We generally have a sense of who it is that did that. I'm not gonna say who it is because the police are working through the investigations, but generally have a sense of who it is. We're pursuing charges. It's not something I really want to do. I sat in the parking lot of the DPD yesterday going like, Ugh, why are you doing this.
Bree: Why are you doing it?
Jeff: Yeah, well, I don't want to. Right, right. And because you kick off a really big system when you do that, right, and now I'm gonna be tied to this person forever, and I'm generally a pretty forgiving person. I just wanna move on with my life and have other things to do. I want to do other things rather than this.
But I like going to these events and I think it's important to send a message that, if you do something like that, if you're going to physically attack me, I am going to take it all the way. So you need to think twice about that. And look, I end up with people with middle fingers in my face all the time and curse words. That doesn't bother me. But once you cross the line and you're physically attacking people and hurting people, then you need to be held accountable, and I want other journalists and media personalities to be able to have that freedom to be down, even if you're at a conservative rally, like the March for Life. I joked — I saw, actually, I saw Heidi Beedle like thirty seconds before this all happened.
Bree: [Who is a] journalist from Colorado Springs who has been on our show.
Jeff: [Yes, from the] Colorado Times Recorder. Heidi and I don't see eye to eye on anything, but I was joking with Heidi. It's like, hey Heidi, I see you at these March for Life protests, and then I know you feel a little uncomfortable. I'm down at the anti-ICE protest. I feel a little uncomfortable. But Heidi needs to be able to go to the March for Life and feel safe, too. So that message needs to be sent to anybody that's out there that you hit, you're gonna be taken all the way through the legal process.
Bree: I wanna step back just for a second, because you said something about the protests where this happened. There was this main group, and then you said an offshoot that you identified as Antifa.
Jeff: Kind of-ish. Antifa-ish.
Bree: What does that mean to you?
Jeff: So black block clothing, right?
Bree: So, protective [attire]
Jeff: All the way, all the way down. You just see the eyes. They tend to get a lot more animated. I've run into these folks in the past before and they're at a different level of, I would say, anger, rage, frustration than what you would say. Now, Antifa isn't like, you know, they don't necessarily wear membership identification, so it's hard to say clearly that those were Antifa, but that was the group that ended up marching up Broadway all the way to I-25, and then tried to engage up there, and that's where the unlawful orders were given.
So they tend to be a lot more active people that, and to their credit, I've run into them now multiple times. The Denver Socialists that I think are the ones that put on a lot of these protests, like they're the main organizing folks, they oftentimes will keep their own members in check because they understand.
And if you listen to the video, you hear that at the end, he goes to the perpetrator of the attack, “Don't don't engage him, don't talk to him. You're going to ruin our image.” I dunno if you caught that audio at the very end, “you're going to ruin our image.” I've run into that before where the organizers, the Denver Socialists I think, or the, uh, they, they wear red tend to work really hard to make sure that their message is the message that leads, and it's not distracted by things that are happening, like vandalism or violence. So to their credit, they tend to try to police their own people pretty well.
Bree: But this was an offshoot?
Jeff: Yeah.
Bree: Okay. I find it interesting just because, when I hear Antifa, I just think antifascism and the anti-fascist movement. I would assume, I think you're probably talking about the Party for Socialism and Liberation, the PSL folks who probably are usually leading in red. Or the Democratic Socialists. I do wanna be clear, those are two different groups.
I mean, they all have similar ideologies, but it sounds like the group you're describing as Antifa is maybe, uh, you say like, more active, more physically confrontational. And that's who you followed.
Jeff: Yeah, that was the little subgroup that was on the side that I went to. I mean, they're half a block from each other, so it's not a big difference — but it was a notable difference.
Bree: Why go towards those folks and not along with the other folks in red?
Jeff: Yeah, I covered both.I was there, kind of walking around all of it. So the fun, the funny thing about these protests is that they often times put somebody on me to follow me around and then they interrupt my interviews to get them. And they do this a little, like, “don't talk to this guy, don't talk to this guy.” Actually put out a video today about that 'cause it's kind of funny. Then I turn around and I try to get them to talk and it becomes this kind of little shtick. But um, no I try walk around and cover it all. And it's important for me to say this, I'm not a journalist, okay?
Bree: Okay.
Jeff: Okay. I'm very clear about this. I'm a radio personality who has a career and conservative activism.
Bree: You maybe could see why folks might not want their people to talk to you? I don't know. Not saying that we shouldn't be talking to each other, but…
Jeff: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jeff: I mean but I'm not, and it's important to distinguish me from an actual journalist. So I'm making videos. They're funny. They're little gotcha videos.
Bree: Okay. So they're gotcha videos. Are you clear with people when you're talking to them? [Like] “I am not a journalist. I'm a conservative activist.”
Jeff: Yeah. If they ask, what I often ask them for is to tell me why they're out here, okay. I don't manipulate the interviews in the sense of, um, putting words in their mouths or editing it in a way that, um, would really make them look bad. From my perspective.
Bree: I have to, I just have to disagree for a minute because from watching the videos, I could see [why] if I was in that group, [I’d be] urging folks not to talk to you because it does come off to me as edited to make people look stupid that are talking to you.
Jeff: Yeah, no — I disagree with that. I, what I do, and I do this on my show too, so I host Denver's top talk radio show and we have, uh, it's a call-in show. So people call in all the time. What we do is poke and prod around the edges of their policies.
So my interview to you is not necessarily to just get your perspective. I wanna challenge your thinking, too. So think of the girl for instance, that's saying, um. We, uh, about criminals. About the deportation of criminals, right? We're having a discussion. I don't know if you saw that video. We're having a discussion about the deportation of criminals.
I ask her about Laken Riley. “Do you know the name? Laken Riley?” And she doesn't. Okay. I would disagree that that's being edited in a way to make her look stupid, but it's very clear that she's not fully informed when it comes to policy issues. And that's an important message to get across that you know, you're dealing with people that are coming out to protest and they may not necessarily know all the policy nuances. And so I'm poking it probably the same way I would if you called into our radio show.
Bree: But I've seen videos of you with conservatives at conservative rallies and you really, to me, they come off as softball questions to your friends versus poking and prodding people that you don't agree with.
Jeff: I, I would disagree because when I would like the March for Life, for instance, you're talking about those videos, the March for Life videos, I'll ask them, you know, questions about “when does life begin?” “Are you interfering with a woman's rights to choose?” Those types of things? So I'll ask, I'll ask questions around.
Bree: “How do you feel about this rally that you're at?” That feels a little bit easier to me than “do you know about the Laken Riley case that led to this legislation?”
Jeff: Yeah. Yeah, sure.
Bree: And I guess I would characterize these [rallies] differently. I would call that an anti-abortion rally. You would call it a March for Life, [where] you asked one woman, like, “where does your joy come from?” I don't know if I've ever seen you ask someone you identify as antifa “where does your joy from?”
Jeff: Yeah. Oh, I’d push back and say there's not a lot of joy there.
Bree: I feel like that's an assumption you're making about [antifa]. I use a lot of cuss words and I'm a happy person.
Jeff: I just wanna state that like I, I hear you, what you're saying.
Bree: This approach — I don't feel like you give an equal playing field depending on which kind of march you're at.
Jeff: Well, that's a fair critique. And I don't think I'm trying to necessarily give an equal playing field either because I'm not a journalist in the sense of I'm trying to cover the story from, in an objective way. I think I'm pretty clear about that. I think most people know that at this point, that's gonna be a fun, kind of robust discussion where things are poked around the sides.
Um, and some people engage with that, others don't. So, and if somebody doesn't want to talk, we don't put it on.
Bree: I mean, you're giving a good case to me for why someone wouldn't wanna talk. If you're asking one person you agree with what their joy comes from, and then another person “give me a specific about a specific case” I can see where it doesn't seem like fun.
Jeff: Okay. I mean, I, yeah, I disagree.
Bree: I just wanna say, I don't know — I feel like the way that you edit the videos too can come off as like, trying to exacerbate the situation to make this, you know, to make someone you disagree with look not great.
Jeff: I would disagree in the sense that I don't think that what you don't get in these videos is a kind of shouting back and forth type of thing. I've never said to anybody, I think you're stupid. I ask probing questions that they often can't answer, and I find that as interesting and compelling when you've taken the time to build a sign. So, for instance, Donald Trump, they might build a sign that says “Donald Trump's a king.” [So I’d ask] what has he done that makes him a king?
Bree: I feel like he put out an AI-generated image of himself [as king].
Jeff: Well, you're answering that, but when I ask somebody that question, okay. And they don't have an answer, right? So you, you took the time to build a sign, you've come down to a protest. And then when I ask a very simple, what I would say is a softball question, right?
Tell me what you think he's done that makes him a king and they don't have an answer. That at least on the conservative side is kind of entertaining to watch. But I don't necessarily see it as a gotcha question. Mean-spirited.
Bree: Does that make their protest invalid? Because they don't have an answer for you?
Jeff: No.
Bree: Well, let's go back to the video you were talking about, where you were explaining that you were submitting a formal report to the Denver Police.
Jeff: Yes.
Bree: You said in this video that you love Denver and were filing the report because you love the city so much — I have to say we don't hear that from conservatives very often. Um, what do you see in Denver that you think maybe your fellow conservatives are missing?
Jeff: Well, I think typically what conservatives are longing for Denver's return to back what it was like, I would say in the nineties, early two-thousands type of stuff.
Bree: I just wanna say we didn't always have a great reputation. If you remember the “summer of violence,” I would just say there's lots of incidents where we could see either side of Denver.
Jeff: So we used to host the Western Conservative Summit in Denver, and when we would do so in 2012, 2013, what people do, the experience that they would have is they would come to the event at the Convention Center and they would go out to restaurants all along 16th Street Mall and enjoy that.
When I tried to host the Western Conservative Summit here in 2022 I think was the last one we did here. Uh, the feedback we got is we'll never attend this event again if you host it in downtown Denver, which was not typical of the response we got from our folks. They didn't feel safe in this city.
The homelessness, the drug use, the smell of urine, the closed restaurants. So what conservatives are responding to is they want to get to, they wanna get back to that idea of being able to freely enjoy the city without fear. And what I've pushed Mike Johnston on. That's what I call the um, “Woman in Pearls and Diamond Rings” theory. Have you heard about that?
Bree: No, but I actually have a tweet from you that I was going to ask you about where you said this in November of 2024: “Denver is crumbling because people with disposable income won't visit it. City budget is squeezed as a result. Lower sales tax revenue — Denver will continue to decline until women in fur coats, pearls and diamond rings can walk the 16th Street mall safely first.”
I feel like you're describing someone from like, 1900.
Jeff: Possibly.
Bree: Tell me about this theory.
Jeff: So the theory is and, and the image is used to give you like a bold image, right? Um, but Denver requires a sales tax in order to operate. I mean, 50% of its revenue comes from sales tax and you only get that money if people spend and buy things. You can't force people to give it up in a tax unless they're willing to freely part with their own money. So you have to have a city that's so safe that the people with disposable income can freely walk this city.
And people with disposable income don't visit places they don't feel safe in. I think there's an actual law of physics that criminals and families won't operate in the same space because if you are a criminal that um, is free, is kind of freed to operate, then there's obviously not enough police in order for the families to feel safe to be in that spot.
And if there's enough police to where families feel safe to come to the city of Denver. Well then obviously there's not criminals because there's a lot of police operating. So the city of Denver, I think it's pretty simple for Mike Johnston to turn the city around. He needs to basically do what George Brauchler did at his press conference. I don't know if you remember this, when George became the district attorney of Judicial District 23, he brought out a big map and he said, “We're gonna be so tough on crime in judicial District 23, Douglas County, parts of Arapahoe, Elbert, Lincoln County, that if you choose to do crime here, you will pay a very serious penalty.”
And in fact, he brought up a map and he says, “here are all the roads where you can drive around our county if you're a criminal, because we're gonna prioritize families first.” If the mayor of Denver wanted to even come up with his, implement his ideas around. You know, um, housing first for homeless, those types of things, he needs money to do it. You get money from people with the, oh, you get money from people with disposable income, freely visiting this city and feeling safe enough to be here. So crime has to be his top priority. His number one top priority. So he can bring in the money to do the other stuff he wants to.
Bree: So you think that the answer to solving the crime problem however you perceive it, is more police.
Jeff: Police the hell out of the city.
Bree: Something else you mentioned when you were talking about a lack of feeling safe here was smelling urine. And I just wonder, have you ever thought about advocating for public restrooms?
Jeff: I've seen those as kind of weird, I'll be honest. Maybe I've seen them in I've seen them in Amsterdam and it was just a dude kind of peeing in a urinal in the middle of a of a community. I maybe, maybe I would be open to it. You'd have to, but they seem a little weird to me.
Bree: A bathroom that everyone can use is weird?
Jeff: Well, the ones I've seen.
Bree: Okay.
Jeff: It's just he was like standing in a corner, like fully kind of, with like a little bit of things on the side to protect seeing a face. He's just, he was like peeing in the middle of a...
Bree: Well, I would say that's not all of the types [of restrooms]. And police aren't gonna fix somebody — I mean, sure they can stop someone from urinating on the street, but you're a human, right? When you gotta go, you gotta go.
Jeff: Yes. Correct. So I would be a little concerned about the expense too. Where was it? Was it San Francisco where they built a really expensive public bathroom and it costs like millions of dollars. So I'm not sure it's the best use of taxpayer funds, but I understand, I understand what you're saying. If it would solve maybe one of the problems if it's smelling so bad. But I'm just concerned about what it would look like and the cost. So I'm open to the idea.
Bree: I'd recommend Hawaii. They have all public beaches, and those all have public restrooms. It's incredible. And you have four kids — you know what it's like when a kid's gotta go to the bathroom. Anyway. We're not, we're not here to talk about bathrooms. It's just, it's something I find fascinating when people lump that in with crime. It's interesting to me.
Um, so [producer] Paul [Karoly] has a little bit of information here — CBS says “a private company ended up donating a prefab bathroom, but the cost still added up to about $200,000. The city said union workers had to connect the plumbing and build out other infrastructure.” That was the San Francisco one you were talking about, so, sure. Costly.
Bree: Um, so, okay, let's go back to this, like — your approach. Have you ever talked to someone at one of these liberal or progressive protests that made you think about an issue in a different way?
Jeff: Yes, and in fact, I'm gonna release a video on that probably today, just this last week at the anti-ICE protest. Um, I had a great conversation with a woman whose father is a border patrol agent and whose mother is an immigrant. That was really cool. That was really cool conversation. Now, the in-depth conversations tend not to always make it onto social media, right? Because social media's
Bree: Because we know…
Jeff: Quicker.
Bree: We know what people wanna see, right?
Jeff: Right. So there's an, there's an editor's element to that, but this one I'm gonna put up because it was actually a really compelling conversation. So it's important for everybody to understand, and I, I don't wanna hide this. Like, if we have a normal conversation with these protests, it probably just doesn't make it on the social media because it, it's the same problem that PBS and others have, when you have a in-depth public policy conversation, it's not the most entertaining.
Bree: We have that problem on podcasts too.
Jeff: Right? Right. So, you know.
Bree: You know you have something you really care about. That sounds great. It doesn't have a hook or it doesn't feel, it doesn't enrage people. I don't know. I mean, we know. We know what works.
Jeff: There's an element. I host a radio, so there's an element of wrestling that you have to have with it, right? And the, and the kind of tension and back and forth. But this conversation I had was so good and compelling and her background was so interesting that I'll put that up there.
Bree: Could you give us, like the TL;DR? Like what did she say that made you, or like what maybe challenged your perception of, I'm assuming this is the issue we're talking about with immigration?
Jeff: Yep yep. She kept going back to essentially what you're saying. This is a really complicated issue and there's a lot of emotion and you could tell she was really conflicted. And what I appreciated about her is that she wasn't an open borders person. A lot of the folks I talked to at this were just nonsensical open borders people where I'm like, do you have locks on the doors of your house?
And they're like, yeah. I'm like, so you think it's okay to keep some people out of places? Not a country. So I mean, like there, there was like a logical breakdown that would happen with some people, but with her, she understood that we have to be a nation of laws and we can't just allow anybody in. But at the same time, there's reasons why people have come to this country and we need to understand that living in some of those other countries are, are, are, are really terrible situations. So the complexity of the issue came through with her, which I really appreciated.
Bree: Do you, would you share more of that on your, um, through your social media? If you had more conversations like that, even if they don't get the clicks or the views?
Jeff: Well, I often feel like I have that for four hours with my co-host. So my co-host is more progressive minded. I wouldn't put him fully in the Democrat camp, but he's not a fan of Trump. So what we've recreated with our radio show is four hours of the old Hannity and Combs that you may have seen on Fox. Every morning, five days a week, and he and I go back and forth. So for instance, today was on Padilla.
Bree: Alex Padilla, the Senator.
Jeff: The US Senator from California. And whether or not that was right.
Bree: He was tackled during a press conference.
Jeff: Yes. And then handcuffed.
Bree: Right. Even he has the right to, I mean in this country, right? To, to voice his opinion.
Jeff: Sort of, it was in a press conference. He interrupted the Secretary of Homeland Security and was very belligerent in my opinion. And then when asked to leave, refused to leave and actually pushed back on the security that was there. You and I are having the, literally the exact same conversation I had earlier this morning. 'Cause he's a more progressive-minded going, you know, was he treated rudely, he identified himself as a senator, all that stuff.
And were they, was there a strong, overt use of force to him? So these discussions, these debates take place for four hours every day. And anybody can call in. I mean anybody can. So if you think that my opinion on something is bad, by all means call in and the whole city can hear that conversation. It's very unique. It's why we're Denver's top talk radio show.
Bree: But you're still, I feel like, I mean, we know this, there's certain segments of the population that watch, uh, broadcast news. There's folks that listen to podcasts. There's folks that listen to talk radio. Social media has this ability to immediately connect with millions of people and go viral.
So I do find it interesting that it feels like you have one conversation in one arena, but you wanna do something different. I mean, it's strategy.
Jeff: But, but also it has to do with the means so, or the, sorry, the medium. Right now what's becoming really popular on social media are 60-second soap operas. It's our attention spans, right? Are so short. So I have a four hour conversation on deep policy discussions back and forth with anybody that wants to, and then when I post a clip of me getting kicked in the back, it gets 8 million impressions because it's that quick, right? So part of it is the medium and you just have to respond to it.
Bree: Before we go, I have to ask you a really important question 'cause you've posted about this several times. Why do you hate nose rings in women?
Jeff: Oh gosh, I don't, do you have a nose ring?
Bree: I don't, but many of my ilk do.
Jeff: Yeah. Yeah.
Bree: I'm a, I'm a Catholic witch from a very queer world, and, uh
Jeff: Are you an actual witch?
Bree: I'm also a confirmed Catholic, so. Huh. We come in all stripes.
Jeff: Ooh, you and I, I have a feeling this is just the beginning of a very beautiful relationship we're gonna have.
Bree: So Yeah. Well, okay. I will be fair. Our producer, Olivia, has a nose ring and she saw that and was like, why does he hate nose rings so much?
Jeff: I'm kind of an old school Republican in the sense that I'm like, girls with pearls are just really cute.
Bree: Oh my
Jeff: Gosh. Did I make you laugh? Did I make the witch laugh?
Bree: You can. Hey, witches are fun too. You don't know – maybe if you ask some of these antifa people some more joyous questions
Jeff: Okay, so here's what I'm gonna do, Bree. Yeah. Next time I'm down there I'm gonna ask them about their joy. That is gonna make a hell of a video.
Bree: I'd love to see it.
Jeff: Where does your joy come from?
Bree: I'd love to see it.
Jeff: Brilliant. I just can't get kicked next time.
Bree: I agree. I totally agree with you. I don't want anyone to get kicked. Jeff, thank you so much for joining me.
Jeff: It was fun, Bree.
