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And now, from the University of Chicago Institute of Politics and CNN Audio, the Axe Files, with your host David Axelrod.

George Will has been an area-dite and in-sice of commentator for conservatism at the National Review, Newsweek, The Washington Post.

He won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1977.

And what I appreciate about him is that he is consistent in his principles, even when it means taking on Republican presidents from Nixon to Trump,

who he believes are perverting conservative principles.

I sat down with George Will recently in Washington to talk about his life and career and the state of American politics and conservatism today.

George Will, it's great to see you, lots to talk about in these turbulent times.

But before we get to all of that, I want to talk about you and your life.

I think one of the phrases that always comes up when people describe you is professorial.

And I learn by reading that you come by that naturally.

Well, I'm the son of a college professor, Fredric L. Will, professor of philosophy at the University of Illinois for 37 years.

I went to Princeton and got a PhD intending to teach and briefly did at Michigan State University and then the University of Toronto.

Actually, when I left Oxford, I applied to Harvard Law School in Princeton and Philosophy.

I chose Princeton because it was midway between two national league cities.

Yeah, we were going to talk about baseball, too.

So yes, I come from an academic background and family.

And where's your family from?

The wills were from Western Pennsylvania.

My grandfather's father was a Lucerne minister who went from one said bear perished to another,

and he went up into Norah, Pennsylvania, ground zero for what's happened to this steel industry.

So they graduated into the depression and fortunately found a job teaching.

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