Michael Knowles hosted a live “Bar Fight” event in Nashville where he challenged Harry Sisson on charges ranging from housing migrants in a private New York apartment to whether the killing of Renee Good could be justified after an encounter with ICE. The back-and-forth grew heated as audience members pressed Sisson, and the exchange moved from policy to questions of force and accountability.
The live taping in Nashville set the tone for a direct clash between conservative host Michael Knowles and commentator Harry Sisson. Knowles opened with a blunt, real-world question about whether Sisson would follow Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey’s request to house undocumented migrants. The audience got involved fast, and the crowd’s questions pushed the discussion beyond abstract policy into personal choices.
“Um, so I come from the great land of the chieftain Elizabeth Warren,” one audience member said. “And I would like to know, Maura Healey is our governor, and she has asked citizens of Massachusetts to take illegal immigrants into their homes and house them because they don’t have enough housing for all of them. So I just want to know, answer my question first. Are you willing to do what Maura Healey asked the citizens of Massachusetts to do and house illegal immigrants in your own home? Because she asked us to do that. I wasn’t willing to do that.”
“You don’t have to,” Sisson replied. “And that’s exactly the point I’m about to make. Um, so you’re making the point I was about to make, which is it’s voluntary. Um, she’s asking citizens to step up if they want you don’t nobody’s forcing you and by the way, we already have programs.”
“Just be quiet, I’m getting to it,” Sisson continued as a member of the crowd shouted at him to answer the question. “If you listen, if you listen, if you listen.” Knowles kept the pressure on with a mixture of incredulity and humor as he pushed to land a simple, clear answer from Sisson about his willingness to host migrants.
“He says he’s gonna get to it, I’ll believe him for now,” Knowles said. The host pressed on and triggered a revealing, short answer about personal housing in New York that underscored the practical limits many face. “Okay, unfortunately, I will not be taking anybody in because I have a one-bedroom in New York City,” Sisson said. “It’s very expensive.”
Knowles pressed further with the kind of straight questions that land in these live debates. “So, hold on, you have a one-bedroom?” Knowles asked. You don’t have a studio? A lot of New Yorkers have studios.
“Well, it depends on where you live,” Sisson said. “It depends on where you live,” Knowles agreed. The back-and-forth kept circling practical realities, like space and cost, with Sisson repeating that the decision is voluntary and that existing programs handle placements.
“No, i’m sorry, unfortunately, I don’t unfortunately I don’t have any space. Unfortunately, for now. I don’t have any space. But if you have space in your home and you want to play into a program that we’ve already had for a very long time, you can do so, but nobody’s forcing you to take anybody in your home. Nobody’s forcing you to take anybody in your home.
“Wow, to hear I live in a one-bedroom in New York, and I don’t have any space,” Knowles said. “That’s a mansion.” The audience laughed, but the exchange highlighted a broader point politicians rarely own: policy asks are not the same as private obligations, especially when municipalities and states outsource the work without the resources.
The conversation then pivoted hard to a different, much darker subject: the fatal shooting of Renee Good and whether an ICE agent was struck by her SUV. Knowles asked directly, “You just said, Harry, that Renee Good was murdered by an ICE officer. Do you not think that being hit by an SUV is a justification for using deadly force?” The question framed the legal and moral center of the debate.
“If you’re looking at the footage frame by frame, and I saw you get walked by Adam Mochler on this, can you be quiet?” Sisson exclaimed as the crowd began to jeer. “Well, I’m up here. You’re over there. I’m meant to be talking.” Knowles pushed for a clear answer on whether the SUV contact justified lethal force.
“How did I get walked?” Knowles asked. “Harry, here’s a question. Did Renee Good hit the officer with her SUV?” “Wait, wait, wait, if you look at the frame by frame…” Sisson began. “That’s a simple question,” Knowles pressed. “You don’t need a paragraph.”
“Michael, you would agree that this is a more nuanced issue,” Sisson insisted. “I would not agree with that. Did this woman hit the officer with her SUV?” When pressed, Sisson said, “Her SUV bumped the officer, which still does not justify…” Knowles shot back, “She bumped him with a 3,000-pound SUV?” and then pushed the moral test to its limit.
“Michael, if I tapped you on the shoulder right now, can you shoot me in the face?” Sisson asked. “If you tapped me with your SUV, I probably would, yeah.” The exchange showed how debate over policy quickly becomes a dispute over facts and force, and why conservatives insist on clear accountability for law enforcement actions.
Arguments like this at live events tend to expose the gap between abstract positions and hard choices. Knowles left no room for equivocation, while Sisson tried to thread nuance about programs and proportionality. The audience reaction underscored how these questions matter to everyday voters.
