The Tucker Carlson Show
Ryan Zink on What It’s Like to Disappear Into the American Gulag for Political Crimes
16 Feb 2026
Chapter 1: What happened to Ryan Zink on January 6th?
Ryan Zinke. Not Ryan Zinke. No. No. Not Ryan Zinke. Very different. Ryan Zinke. Thank you very much. So you're running for Congress. I am. From Texas. Yes. Lots of people running for Congress from Texas. The reason I thought we would all benefit from hearing your story is that you were a January 6th defendant and you went through many years of...
both literally and figuratively in the aftermath of that.
Chapter 2: Did ANTIFA play a role in the events of January 6th?
And you've emerged as a real candidate. And so I'd just like to begin by hearing your J6 story. Why did you go to Washington on January 6th and what happened?
So I guess to summarize, make things a little bit shorter, is I was out on a break from school. I was studying media strategy, public relations, but I got hit by a drunk driver. And so my dad worked in sports medicine for years, and I had a lapse in my insurance coverage. So I went to Arizona to work on his congressional campaign. So he was at the time running against Ruben Gallego. Your dad?
Yes. Oh, wow. Where were you?
You said you were in college when this happened.
Yes. Yeah. So I came in late in college.
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Chapter 3: What was the FBI's raid on Zink's house like?
I stopped and built wind turbines for a while. I kind of bounced. I didn't really find anything that I really loved until I found safety. And then, of course, now politics, apparently. But yeah.
So I was helping him with his, you know, congressional campaign because I was in media, like I had a camera, you know, and I was like, we started off slow like everybody else does, you know, with his campaign where money was super tight. And so I went up there to one, get free treatment for my neck and shoulder. And then from your dad.
Chapter 4: What did Ryan Zink experience while in jail?
Yeah. And then two, you know, just to help him on his campaign.
So you're working for your dad in exchange for free neck and back treatment. Yeah.
Pretty much. Nothing free out of the old man. Okay. But, no, I mean, you know, it was really my first glance in politics. Like, the first time that I had ever voted was Donald Trump's first term. Yeah.
Again, the only reason that I thought that was because I was like, you know, well, I've seen what— I met Bill Clinton in college at WT when I used to go there, and I was really weirded out by him when I met him that day. What about him? Um, creepy, soft hands, uh, his demeanor towards, uh, the girls that were in the room in the, like in the back area.
And then, um, the way, just, just the way he carries himself. Uh, I think I was, I think it was discernment is what I think it was. Interesting.
So bad vibes would be one way to put it.
Yeah. And this is, and this is like before I was like really a Christian too, like, you know, living, practicing, you know, my life in accordance.
Well, those are animal instincts and we should never ignore them because they're accurate.
Well, definitely, you know, like looking back now and, you know, everything I've been through. Yeah, it was definitely, it was a stark warning. Really? To like be vigilant, be aware of what's happening around you. Interesting. Huh. So, but yeah, so campaign trail, you know, going out, well, dad, we started looking at, you know, the votes about everything that's going on.
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Chapter 5: How does Zink describe the lies of corporate media?
And I was like, well, okay. I was like, I guess like we can do this. So I started thinking, I was like, you know, your dad's encouraging you to, yes. Yeah. He, he wanted me to go. Cause he wants, you know, he wants B roll footage. He wants, you know, uh, you know, him, uh, at the Capitol, you know, in front of all the fountains.
And, you know, we wanted to present, you know, like a strong, unified presence in media, just like, you know, every candidate wanted to. Yeah.
So your dad believed that footage of him at the Capitol on January 6th would be good for his campaign.
Yes.
And not just that, but like... So obviously he wasn't planning to file an insurrection or he wouldn't have brought you as his cameraman.
No, no. If we were planning an insurrection, I would have brought a lot more that day than, you know, just my camera on. Yeah, so he wasn't even actually in the best of good health at that time. Like, there was a time like six years before that that I thought I was going to lose my dad. Like, we were actually like planning funerals and kind of looking at stuff.
So, it was a hard time, but then, you know, God healed him in that December. And, you know, we've been rocking and rolling ever since. But, yeah. You know, we were both, like, actively hurt. Like, it would have been very hard-pressed for us to do an insurrection that day. You know, my neck and shoulder injuries. Like, my shoulder was, like, froze up here like this for, like, six months.
And, you know... Wow. Like, I did physical therapy for, like, two years. But, you know, it...
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Chapter 6: What challenges did Ryan Zink face during his arrest?
it just it's it's insane looking back because we thought that you know we were going to see history for the first time that you know the vote would get kicked back to the states and that you know the states will vote party line you know uh for what that that was what we thought was going to happen and it turned out to be completely different you know i
I remember getting in on January 5th, staying with some family and like the, I think it was like the upper Marlboro, Maryland area and making our way across, you know, is the first time in my mind that I can remember. I think I went to DC once when I was younger, but this was very real. It was very, you know, very like you would see in the movies.
Like there's, you know, steam pouring out of the sewers the second that we get off, you know, um,
the metro um there's and there's already like thousands of people it's four o'clock in the morning you know and there's there's already thousands of people like over near the capitol and so i'm i'm already you know taking pictures and this this will be relevant uh later as well but it's it's crazy to step off the metro and that early in the morning there's thousands of people already at the capitol all along
headed up towards the Washington Monument where President Trump was going to be speaking. And then that was pretty much where we started the day. Went in there, I saw Diamond and Silk for the first time walking through. And remember, I'm still not very political at this point.
I believe that there's a lot that's going on with elections that we're being lied to about, but I don't see it in the capacity that I see it today.
um i'm basically there for you know a free trip with my dad to washington dc you know to hang out for a little bit get some some b-roll footage and go home and then um you know so i don't get to go in to where the president is speaking because secret service i have uh laptop I have a camera. I have SD cards. I have multiple lenses. I have a tripod.
I have all this stuff and Secret Service is like, you can't, you know, like we're not allowing anyone else with bags into this area that we're going in. And so I never got to hear Trump speak. at all, like I was already had made my way up to the Capitol.
We stopped and had lunch at a building that I would get to know very well, 333 Constitution Avenue, the courthouse where I was later convicted at. And, you know, we Ate lunch over there and then made our way all the way down to the Capitol. My dad did an interview with the Epoch Times.
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Chapter 7: How did Ryan Zink's faith influence his experience?
It just doesn't make sense to me. I got called a conspiracy theorist by my judge for even mentioning this fact. Right. So, you know, I believe that there were people in the crowd that day. I believe that Bobby Powell—rest in peace, Bobby— I believe that he also captured federal agents that day near that window that were telling people to go in the building. But we don't have any— Of course.
And tell us who Bobby Powell was.
Bobby Powell was an independent journalist who—he testified in my case. He was press that was there that day just to, you know, take videos. He was never arrested, you know.
anything but he mysteriously after he started releasing and talking about all of the footage that he had of these federal agents uh so came to multiple heart attacks and then eventually passed away from one of those he didn't kill himself like some of the capital police officers no no he didn't and bobby bobby was a was a marine he was a very strong-willed man and there's not a chance that he would have ever taken his own
Yeah. Well, you could say that about others who supposedly killed themselves too. Just a fact. Sorry. I'm sick of this.
I am too. Just for the record, I'm very mentally sound and I have no plans to harm myself after this interview either.
Um, yeah, I used to say that in jest, but it's, it's, I mean, let's just, let's stop pretending. Yeah. So, um, okay. You saw someone who's been conclusively identified as an Antifa member smash the windows.
Yes. Who's, who's not been seen since. Like, he got a prison sentence. He has not come to any of the J6 functions that I'm aware of. I don't know people that know him. Like, J6 is, you know, 1500 plus. Never heard from this dude again.
Did he go to prison?
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Chapter 8: What are Zink's plans and motivations for running for Congress?
So then we leave. We go back around. I take some pictures by the bike racks where what I think is blood is on the ground, but I'm not sure. It could have been a spilled drink. It could have been anything where the bike racks were. And we start making our way around. And then I see Jacob Chansley, which we all came to know as the QAnon shaman. I saw him on the steps of the Senate side.
and we make our way around to the west and this is when it hits and it's like this is going to be talked about forever because the sea of people that were out there just thousands and thousands of people that are on that side we have no like we're on the east side sheltered in a tiny little corner We have no idea the scale of what is happening at the Capitol.
And people always talk about the West Side footage and things. They always show the tunnel videos where you see people attacking. Well, the reason that they were attacking that day is because a Metro police officer, Lila Morris, had just beaten a woman to death by the name of Roseanne Boyland. And that's what they were reacting to.
And so as we're making our way around to go get onto the metro, the closest metro was directly across the west back towards the other side. So we made a beeline through the crowd.
Are you allowed to beat people to death in this country?
Well, apparently, if you wear a badge in D.C., which if you don't know, like across the standard, the Capitol Police and Metro Police, with their combined, particularly on the Metro side, is the ninth most violent police force in America. Yeah, of course. You think about that. Think about all the sheriff's offices, the police offices around the country.
They're the ninth most violent police force.
They always had the highest accidental discharge rate for their handguns, too.
Yeah.
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