FOOD FIGHT: Kinnett and Knowles Explain What’s Really Behind the Burrito Wars

In what has been “”the weirdest, goofiest” manifestation of divides on the right, at least according to Daily Signal’s Tony Kinnett, some on the right are at each other’s throats over the cost of burritos.

The debate started when TPUSA’s Andrew Kolvet took to X to relay a recent conversation he had with a young conservative. Kolvet’s post kicked off a food fight on social media about affordability. Tony Kinnett and The Daily Wire’s Michael Knowles weighed in on the burrito wars on Thursday night.

Kinnett and Knowles said this issue is not about Mexican fast food but affordability. “It’s obviously about affordability, right?” Kinnett mentioned. “And whether the economy is getting better and what’s doing it.”

“I’ve never seen a debate so accurately cast everyone talking past each other,” Kinnett added.

Knowles said the issue is even deeper than affordability. “I think where the disagreement lay is not even so much in economic terms or in affordability itself, but in how to talk to normal people who don’t tweet about burritos all day,” Knowles said. It’s about “how to talk to normal people when the normal people complain about the economy.”

Knowles also said the “real divide” is as old as the modern conservative movement. While the neoconservatives and libertarians “worship the free market,” and have “a focus on the self,” Knowles said, the traditionalists and populists are more likely to argue that fast food should not be such a luxury item, necessitating lower prices.

While the neoconservatives and libertarians would tell people to make more money so they can buy more burritos, or cook at home, Knowles said that the traditionalists and populists argue that “we actually have a responsibility to be sensitive to what our constituents are talking about.”

“So, it’s not really about burritos. It’s about the fact that home prices rose 30% from 2019 to 2024. Wages rose 9% and a lot of young people can’t buy a home. Meanwhile, these 350,000 Haitians that the judges won’t let Trump kick out, a lot of them do have homes,” Knowles continued.

Failure to address these structural economic issues could lead to “ushering in socialism,” Knowles warned. “Guess what, Libertarians? You’re going to get socialism a lot faster than even you think,” if these issues go unaddressed, Knowles claimed.

Knowles also had thoughts on how the right might be able to properly channel persistent economic anxiety. “The way you channel it is to say, ‘Hey, yes, you have legitimate grievances. They’re largely caused by the left, but they have been exacerbated by both parties. The socialists are selling you a bill of goods that’ll only make your problems worse. You need to work with us. We’re bringing prices down now. We’re trying to fix the underlying structures in the economy.’”

“If you don’t acknowledge what people are actually experiencing, they’re going to go look to the other guy and the other guy’s going to make things a lot worse,” Knowles warned.