As someone who often tries (and fails) to buy tickets to various shows and hosts ticketed events myself, I know how broken America’s ticket industry is.
If you’ve ever tried to buy a ticket to see your favorite band, comedian, or sports team, you’ve probably been told the show was “sold out” minutes after tickets went on sale. You refresh the page, wait in “virtual lines,” and still lose out to people who, let’s be honest, probably aren’t even real people.
It happened to me when trying to buy Chicago Cubs playoffs tickets and made me livid.
Fortunately, President Trump is now taking on abusive ticket practices head-on.
This is proof that he’s serious about helping the American people, not the swamp or big business. Because let’s be real: What special interest is lobbying to fix this problem?
Who’s spending millions in D.C. to stop ticket bots from scooping up seats or to make sure there’s more transparency on ticket availability to the general public? No one.
There’s no corporate PAC behind this, no push from the donor class. This is an initiative powered entirely by the president’s desire to help the millions of ordinary Americans who are getting ripped off every time they try to see a show.
This is exactly the kind of fight Trump was elected to take on — one where there’s nothing in it for the swamp, and everything in it for the rest of us.
President Trump signed an executive order directing his team to fix this broken system. He’s put serious people on the job — Attorney General Pam Bondi and Assistant Attorney General Gail Slater at the Department of Justice; Andrew Ferguson, Melissa Holyoak, and Mark Meador at the FTC; and Scott Bessent at Treasury.
Recommended
There are two big problems in the industry that require action.
One, there are too many middlemen ticket bots.
These automated programs, operated by scalpers, scoop up massive amounts of tickets in minutes long before real fans even have a chance. Especially those with blue collar jobs, who can’t stand in a “virtual queue” for hours on a weekday morning.
Two, the system caters too much to the elite.
Too many tickets are quietly reserved for “preferred” buyers. By the time the public on-sale happens, there are barely any tickets left. And much of what’s left goes straight to the bots.
Requiring ticket sellers to disclose, upfront, exactly what percentage of tickets are available to the public would change that. If the major ticket sellers have to show their numbers, they’ll have every incentive to make more tickets available for real fans, because it will look terrible if they don’t. Pair that with serious bot crackdowns, and you start to fix the problem for good.
Now, one thing I’ve seen floated is government capping the cost of re-sale tickets. I get why people thing this looks like a good idea on paper, but it’s a distraction from the real problem.
The problem isn’t the existence of the resale marketplace. It’s that scalper bots and insider deals mean regular people are locked out of face-value tickets — leaving resale as their only option. Fix the bots and the insider carve-outs and the affordability problem will fix itself.
History backs this up. When governments in other countries tried resale price caps, fans didn’t get cheaper tickets — they got fewer safe places to buy them, which led to a spike in fraud.
A friend of mine even recently got stuck buying fake Taylor Swift tickets in one of those countries because there were no trusted ways to buy them. He paid the price, literally.
Again: eliminate the bots, open up public ticket availability, and you eliminate the affordability problem.
Thankfully, the Trump administration is gearing up to do exactly that.
Soon, there will be no more letting bots and insiders robbing hardworking Americans of a fair shot at seeing their favorite shows.
That’s good news for me.
I believe my Cubs, led by Pete Crow-Armstrong and Shota Imanaga, are headed to the World Series again this year — and this time, I don’t want to lose my family’s tickets to a bot.
This is Trump doing what he does best: fighting for the forgotten men and women, not the connected elite.
When the administration’s ticket reform plan drops soon, it’ll be a win for every one of us who’s sick of getting played by the system.
Finally, we’ll be able to get back to cheering for our favorite teams and artists, not refreshing a webpage in frustration.
What’s not to like about that?
Charlie Kirk is the founder and president of Turning Point USA and host of the top-rated podcast and nationally syndicated Salem radio program, “The Charlie Kirk Show”
Editor’s Note: Do you enjoy Townhall’s conservative reporting that takes on the radical left and woke media? Support our work so that we can continue to bring you the truth.
Join Townhall VIP and use the promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your VIP membership!
Join the conversation as a VIP Member