Ben Shapiro, the co-founder of the Daily Wire, replied to a cryptic tweet from employee Candace Owens on Wednesday evening imploring her to “by all means quit” if she feels her work at the Daily Wire “comes between” her and God — as she seemed to imply. The feud escalated from there as Owens quickly shot back and told Shapiro, “You have been acting unprofessional and emotionally unhinged for weeks now.”
Shapiro’s back and forth with Owens is the latest round in an ongoing spat between the two popular hard right podcast hosts. On Tuesday, a clip of Shapiro calling Owen’s “disgraceful” for her recent comments on the Israel-Hamas war went viral in conservative circles.
In the clip, Shapiro responds to a question about Owens and says, “I think that her faux sophistication on these particular issues has been ridiculous.” He went on to call her commentary on Israel, which was riddled with errors, “disreputable.”
Hours later Owens posted a cryptic message to Twitter, writing, “Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
“Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake,” Owens added, quoting Matthew 5:9.
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other,” she concluded, “You cannot serve both God and money.”
Shapiro replied to that tweet writing, “Candace, if you feel that taking money from The Daily Wire somehow comes between you and God, by all means quit.”
Owens replied to Shapiro’s tweet writing, “You have been acting unprofessional and emotionally unhinged for weeks now. And we have all had to sit back and allow it and have all tried to exercise exceeding understanding for your raw emotion.”
“But you cross a certain line when you come for scripture and read yourself into it,” she added, concluding, “I will not tolerate it.”
Owens and Shapiro have exchanged barbs over Israel and anti-Semitism in the past. Shapiro slammed her for retweeting far-left, anti-Israel blogger Max Blumenthal and publicly admonished her for defending Kanye West after his anti-Semitic screeds.
Owens has a long history of controversial and outlandish rhetoric including saying Adolf Hitler’s “nationalism” inside Germany was “fine” and that parents who take their kids to drag queen story hour should have them “taken away.”
Have a tip we should know? [email protected]