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Join us as we engage with listeners and field calls on crucial issues of our time. We tackle the debate surrounding gerrymandering, exploring its impact on democracy and governance. We also highlight recent developments in the fight against Planned Parenthood’s funding, shedding light on ongoing legal battles. As the day unfolds, we celebrate 35 years of achievements with the ACLJ, emphasizing the importance of continued support in standing for justice and accountability.
SPEAKER 03 :
We got breaking news.
SPEAKER 06 :
U.S. Senator calls on FBI for help in Texas.
SPEAKER 03 :
Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 06 :
Welcome to Sekulow. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. That’s 1-800-684-3110. We want to have you on the air today. Will Haynes is joining me in studio. CeCe Howell is going to be coming on later on, our senior attorney here at the ACLJ. And towards the end of the show. former director of national intelligence ambassador to germany and of course currently a special envoy the trump administration rick grinnell has been a member of our team for many years now a great member always has great insights you’re going to stay tuned for him there is some breaking news going on beyond the title i know you probably saw what we’re going to be talking about we’re going to move to that in just a moment but i do want to let you know there’s currently if you’re listening to this live of course we’re live from 12 to 1 p.m eastern time there’s currently an active shooter situation right now At Fort Stewart in Georgia, outside of Savannah, Georgia. We don’t have a whole lot of details. There’s a lot of conflicting reports. We will keep you updated on what’s going on there if it comes up, if there’s any more updates during the show. But currently, there have been some casualties reported.
SPEAKER 04 :
uh and that’s what fox news and other sources are saying we don’t know what’s confirmed and what’s not so i don’t want to um specifically say that but will i think we have something that’s right well i just wanted to reiterate what you’re saying is that they have uh placed the military installation this is uh fort stewart it’s east georgia about an hour outside of savannah uh that there has been placed on lockdown as well as some schools in the area And that to the reporting agency, to NBC News locally there, Major Charles Egan gave some information to them just saying that they confirmed there was an active shooter and that they are assessing casualties. So we will see what is going. We will look at that, but we will also be covering other topics today as well.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, and one of them, Will, I think we need to kind of break down that of what’s going on in Texas. This has been the topic of the news over the last, let’s say, 12 hours, 24 hours, really hitting last night, which also involves new redistricting programs that are going on and gerrymandering, essentially, and how we feel about that. Again, we’ve talked about this. You can like it or you can not like it. It is, though, the way the game works right now in the world of politics. So we’re going to break that down, Will, as there’s been some sort of unprecedented moves coming from the left.
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s right. So in Texas, they’re in the middle of a special legislative session. Texas has a very different way that they call their legislature in than many other states. And they’re in this special legislative session where they’re going over and they have votes on things such as relief for the floods that were happening and all of the horrific things that happened in Texas. But one of their items as well is a redrawing of the congressional maps. which is the job of the state legislature. And they are trying to redo this now. And the Democrats in Texas decided to pull a political stunt and that is flee the state. So no business of the state legislature. Can move forward. They fled to places like Chicago and New York to get away and so that they cannot be forced to go to the legislature to vote, which is their duty, what they swore an oath to do. They’re outside of the law and they are fleeing so that there cannot be a quorum, meaning there’s not enough members of the legislative body there to vote, to hold a vote, to even be in session. And so what we’re doing is we’re looking here and they have fled the state. Now you’re seeing officials in Texas as well as Senator Cornyn from Texas sending a letter to the director of the FBI saying Texas may need your help here of wrangling these Texas Democrats who have fled the state in dereliction of their duty.
SPEAKER 06 :
keep talking about that as well again we will be continuing to look at that current report there is an active shooting going on in georgia at fort stewart that again is outside about an hour outside of savannah georgia with some casualties confirmed we don’t have a whole lot more information but we will be staying tuned on that so if you’re watching whether on salem news channel or wherever we are live right now no we will break in if anything uh comes to light that we need to report But as for right now, phone lines are open. We’ll take calls on that. We also take calls on the topic at hand, which is gerrymandering. What are your thoughts? Do you think we need to put an end to this? Do you like it? Do you think it’s just part of the game that politics has to play at this point? 1-800-684-3110. And of course, we are right now at the 35 Years of Victory Drive. Be a part of it right now. Have your donations doubled at ACLJ.org. Scan the QR code you see on the screen. Be right back. Welcome back to Secular. We are covering that breaking news that’s happening right now. We’re going to get back, though, to the main topic at hand. Of course, I was talking about the active shooter situation. You’re watching live happening in Fort Stewart, which is about an hour outside of Savannah, Georgia. We don’t have a whole lot of information. When we do, we’ll report it. But, Will, I know that kind of threw off our first segment, so I think we need to reset what it is we’re talking about here. Because people hear words like gerrymandering. It doesn’t sound like a good word. They hear words like redistricting. People don’t care for those kind of things. However, as you can see in certain states like Illinois that you showed me the map of earlier, this has been part of the political game for a very long time.
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s right. And typically, states redistrict every 10 years, sometimes earlier. They can do it earlier. And that is what’s happening here. This is five years in that Texas is redrawing their map. And it’s up to the legislature to draw up the congressional districts and then vote on them within their own state. It’s not done by the federal government. It’s not controlled by the federal government. The state set their congressional delegation. of members of Congress is based off of census data and how large the population is, how many they can send to the House of Representatives. However, the way those districts are comprised is up to the state themselves. And so as Texas redistricts here, They have now seen resistance from the Democrat Party within their state, the state elected officials. And they have decided that instead of voting on things like aid for those that were hit by those devastating floods just a few weeks ago, or other issues that they have to vote on, because it’s not just the redistricting, that they will leave the state so they are outside of the reaches of the Texas State Police, the Texas Rangers, things of that nature, that they are now in other states. They’re being protected in some places, like the governor of Illinois or the governor of New York are giving them places to stay in order to not have to return because a civil warrant has already been issued to have people the sergeant at arms of the house to bring them back. And why did they leave? Because if they don’t have enough members present in the state house, they cannot have a quorum. So they can’t do any of their official business. They can’t move forward. They can’t have votes. So they are trying to completely stall the process. They’re obstructing the legislative session by leaving the state. Now, the stakes are getting higher. This isn’t the first time Texas Democrats have done this, by the way, to try and block the state’s business from moving forward. Some of the more popular members of the New Democrat Party in Congress, you think about, got their rise to fame because they left Texas at the time. Jasmine Crockett was one of those members that now is in the House of Representatives. So the stakes are now higher for this reason, Logan. The governor has put notice to the Supreme Court of Texas that he believes that the leader of the Democrats should be removed from office. He has vacated his seat by not performing his duties, by leaving the state to obstruct this. That individual member has by Friday to respond. The attorney general of Texas is also taking moves. But we see Senator John Cornyn sending this letter to the director of the FBI, saying, I encourage the Federal Bureau of Investigation to take any appropriate steps to aid in Texas state law enforcement efforts to locate or arrest potential lawbreakers who have fled the state. As a maneuver to avoid legislative responsibilities on August 3rd, 2025, many members in the Texas House of Representatives absconded from the state. Their stated goal was to prevent the legislator from properly meeting in violation of their oath of office. There are other things in here as well as asking them to look at, are there potential violations of the law outside of the legislative issues? But if we have seen that people were offering them private planes, flights to get out of Texas, some people are putting up money to help them stay or eat or live off of while they are out of the state. Is that considered taking a bribe by accepting a benefit to get out of town and not let something move forward?
SPEAKER 06 :
It feels like it should be.
SPEAKER 04 :
Right.
SPEAKER 06 :
I mean, that seems like you’re obstructing justice, you’re obstructing things from going on. And if you’re being paid to do it. Feels pretty bad. It feels very un-American.
SPEAKER 04 :
And very non-Texas. Very non-Texas. But here’s the other thing. The hypocrisy that we’re starting to see out of this. Now, a lot of people don’t like gerrymandering in the way that these districts get drawn. You should come up with a better name. It is a weird name.
SPEAKER 06 :
It automatically makes you feel…
SPEAKER 04 :
uh like you’re doing something illegal right it doesn’t sound like a legal process redistricting process though um is always done by the power uh the the party in power in the state they have the ability to create these maps and if they have enough votes get them through and then that affects the congressional legislate uh delegations But on one hand, you’re hearing people say how bad this is. We have one Texas lawmaker that likened this to the Holocaust with Don Lemon, literally said that what they’re doing in Texas is like the Holocaust about redrawing congressional districts. She later apologized to Fox News about it when they asked her about it. We do. Do you want to play it? Why not? Let’s play it.
SPEAKER 02 :
integration happened and everybody thought they accept us. They don’t accept us. They are showing us who they are. We should believe them. And we better have the courage to stand up. Otherwise, we will fall for anything. And in this country, we will be defeated, deported. I mean, we will lose all of our rights. And if you think it can’t happen, it can. And I will liken this to the Holocaust. People are like, well, how did the Holocaust happen? How is somebody in a position to kill all the people? Well, good people remain silent. Or good people didn’t realize that what happens to them can very soon happen to me or somebody I love. And so even if you made it, man, you have an obligation to help people who can’t because, God forbid, they end up targeting you and your family.
SPEAKER 04 :
So she has since apologized, saying it was an inappropriate statement. She was passionate. But the fact that that’s where your mind would even go.
SPEAKER 06 :
I’d say I’ve heard a lot worse. I feel like when they start evoking the Holocaust, usually it’s like, oh, this is bad.
SPEAKER 04 :
But over congressional redistricting. No, that’s ridiculous. About congressional redistricting. But at the same time, Governor Gavin Newsom in California, all these Democrats are saying how bad this is. And by the way, Illinois, one of the states that they fled to, is one of the worst offenders when it comes to redistricting. Can we show that? Yeah, let’s show the map of Illinois of how their districts are run.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, you may think that’s a river that’s running through the middle of Illinois, but no, that’s just a random district.
SPEAKER 04 :
That pink that separates the two… green districts was completely crafted to give another seat to a democrat because of how conservative the southern part of illinois is and they they have there’s third party groups that try to rate the congressional districts and illinois is one of the worst offenders and that’s where they’re harboring these people to stop them from voting on a plan by their state legislature any time in southern illinois
SPEAKER 06 :
It’s more southern than almost the deep south. There are times you walk through and you’re like, where? How am I in Illinois? Right. It’s so bizarre, but it is cool. It’s a good place.
SPEAKER 04 :
But then you also see what now Gavin Newsom is saying he may do. Well, Gavin does, you know, what he feels like, man. I mean, some lawmakers are saying this is as bad as the Holocaust. He’s two-faced. He’s Harvey Nims. He’s saying, well, if Texas does it, I’m going to redistrict California right now to give us more congressional seats to match that. So it’s the worst thing you can do. It’s anti-democratic, but if they do it, we’re going to do it too. The hypocrisy is so rich throughout this entire story. And I hope that they are able to get back and vote on things that they need to vote on. Historically, these political stunts do nothing to actually stop the legislation. What they end up doing is boosting the profile of some of the members who decided to talk loudly to the press while they had a spotlight on them state lawmakers out of any state really typically unless you live there and that’s all this is it’s a political stunt but they are actually causing real harm to the people of Texas by absconding their duties and fleeing the state instead of going and if they want to vote against it proudly vote against it speak out against it all the way this is all set up and we have a call about that I want to go to Lisa in Texas real quick Lisa running out of time for this segment but I don’t want you to hold any longer go ahead
SPEAKER 07 :
I was just wondering, why can’t they make a rule that if they aren’t there to vote, then whoever shows up to vote is the one who votes? If this was a normal business as usual…
SPEAKER 06 :
You’d think that would be one of the rules. But of course, this is politics. Of course, it’s the government. There’s ways for them to skip out of their job with no consequences. If this happened in any private business, you’d be fired. But of course, that’s not how Washington and even Texas, how the government seems to run.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, exactly. And actually, a quorum is set there to protect members of the minority party. So that legislation isn’t just passed very quickly without them having a say in it. If they call a special legislative section and everyone can’t get back or they try to pull a trick of some sort, it’s actually there to protect the minority party. The minority party, though, is weaponizing this. And instead of saying like, oh, you know, this isn’t the 1800s and our horse and buggy didn’t make it in time. Therefore, you couldn’t vote without us. They are leaving the state to try and weaponize the use of a quorum. And apparently this is a long history in Texas. So we said it’s not very Texas, but they’ve been using this political strategy, according to the Texas Tribune, since 1870. So maybe there is a rich tradition of fleeing the state.
SPEAKER 06 :
I guess it makes sense. Hey, phone lines are open. I’d love to hear from you at 1-800-684-3110. Stay on hold if you’re on hold. But CeCe Hiles will be joining us, senior attorney for the ACLJ, in the next segment with an update on the defunding of Planned Parenthood. We’ll be right back. Welcome back to Secular. CeCe Heil, Senior Attorney here at the ACLJ, is joining us. We want to keep you updated on, obviously, the news that is happening. Of course, the breaking news out of Georgia. Casualties are now being reported right now during an active shooter situation at Fort Stewart. That is a military base in Georgia about an hour outside of Savannah, Georgia. We don’t have a lot more information, but that is something that we are reporting and we are seeing right now. We want to make sure you know that we’re live when we’re live and that we have these kind of updates.
SPEAKER 04 :
And there is a post on the official Facebook page of Fort Stewart and Hunter Army Airfield that says that it is on lockdown status because of an active shooter incident in the 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team area. as well as casualties have been reported and the situation is ongoing so they are not uh it is not over yet for that army base and so prayers for them for law enforcement first responders and and everyone involved with that at this time home state of georgia so we’ll be definitely praying for them we’ll keep you updated though if news uh changes now uh we will get back to the topic of the day but we brought in cc heil because there has been some updates on the defunding of planned parenthood and the fight against that has been happening
SPEAKER 06 :
It feels like forever, but really for the last few weeks as it seems to be flip-flopping after the big beautiful bill was passed. Absolutely.
SPEAKER 05 :
So in Massachusetts, that’s what we’ve been talking about. In Massachusetts, the judge there, there’s a judge there that actually stopped the government from stopping funding. So the funding is now flowing. So she allowed the funding to flow to Planned Parenthood. But that case in Massachusetts was, only applies to Planned Parenthood. And then she broadened it to every affiliate of Planned Parenthood. However, the Family Planning Association of Maine, they are not affiliated with Planned Parenthood. So they still have their funding stopped. So they filed an exact similar suit in Maine as the one in Massachusetts. And we have filed our amicus brief in that case, stating, obviously, that there is no right to government subsidies for abortion. Congress has the power of the purse, and the courts can’t order Congress to spend money that it has declined to spend. This is absolutely a constitutionally, we’ve had it before, the courts, the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court has ruled that states absolutely can make a decision to favor childbirth over abortion, and they can do that with the power of the purse. So once again, this is just, you know, plot by the pro-abortion side to keep taxpayer dollars going into their coffers that taxpayers are funding abortion and we are standing against it.
SPEAKER 04 :
And CeCe, it’s interesting, one, that yes, we did file in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine that brief supporting the government, pointing out the separation of powers issues with the court getting involved here, now trying to force the government to spend what Congress has decided not to spend with a law that was passed and signed by the president. But we also look at what’s happening in Massachusetts because we talked about that judge that set the deadline and then put out a preliminary injunction that affected 25% of Planned Parenthood effectively, still could get funding, but the rest of the 75% couldn’t. And then she said, I’ll take it under advisement. Planned Parenthood was even confused, filed a motion for clarification. The government didn’t waste time and they went ahead and filed their notice of appeal with the court of appeals. Is that the first circuit? I believe saying we’re going to appeals this. Then after that, The judge puts out another preliminary injunction, didn’t tie the two together, didn’t say the previous one is now void because this is a superseding preliminary injunction. And I say now it applies to everyone. Two different preliminary injunctions with a different rationale. so that it appears the government has to expend more resources to fight both of these. The government yesterday filed notice of appeal for the second preliminary injunction. Our team has already has a brief ready on the first notice of appeal. The second one, who was just filed yesterday, but that appeals court has not yet put out a briefing schedule. And one, they could have been waiting, which for the first one, that is a little bit long of a time. Normally you would see that maybe the appeals court was waiting to see what that under advisement turned into. Now we know, and now there’s a second notice of appeal. Maybe they will combine that at their court, which they can do. But again, know that our team is already working and ready to engage this, not just in Maine, but in Massachusetts as well, as we did at the district court level, now at the appeals court, as we fight this, we know, all the way to the Supreme Court.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, and I don’t know, we’ve discussed this too before, but don’t know what that judge was thinking, because… Basically, exactly like you said, hey, this preliminary injunction, I’m going to make a ruling. It only affects 25 percent. And I’m going to take the rest of their advisement. And then then later she takes and orders it to cover every single Planned Parenthood, which. they weren’t all even under her jurisdiction, but she just lumped them all in and said, I’m applying this. So basically it’s a nationwide injunction, which we know the Supreme Court has said you can’t do. So I don’t know if she’s playing these games to somehow try and get around it, if she’s playing these games to prolong it, because it’s only for a year that this funding has been stopped. So she can definitely, let’s drag this process out so that it comes and goes and they still remain getting their funding for a year.
SPEAKER 04 :
And one other interesting caveat to all of this is that, one, we know Planned Parenthood is trying to run out the clock because at least under this appropriations and under this big, beautiful bill, this reconciliation bill, rather, there’s only a year. Now, hopefully the Congress will be able to extend that and keep that going, but it is this year. They are trying to run out the clock so they can get their funding back regardless. The judge obviously has to know that the Supreme Court said nationwide injunctions, universal injunctions are a no-go, as well as they said states can defund Planned Parenthood. It would be weird for the judge not to, even though it’s different arguments, not take that into consideration. The Supreme Court just said a state can do it, but the federal government can’t do it? That doesn’t make any sense when one is governed by the Constitution and then the Supremacy Clause. Typically, the state would be more restricted, not less restricted. Right.
SPEAKER 05 :
Right. And like I said, the Supreme Court has absolutely said that the Congress can make a value judgment favoring childbirth over abortion. And they can do that by the power of the purse. So these are issues that have already gone to the Supreme Court, have already been ruled upon. They’re just trying to be creative again. Like you said, I think extending it out. to keep getting funding for Planned Parenthood and the abortion.
SPEAKER 06 :
So what’s next for us?
SPEAKER 05 :
Our team’s just on it? We watch it. We will absolutely file. As soon as there’s a briefing schedule, we will file in those appeals. Hopefully they will be joined in Massachusetts. We just filed in Maine. We’ll watch that. We will file every chance we get.
SPEAKER 06 :
That does not happen without you. Of course, we are celebrating 35 years of victory today. You know, we haven’t talked about it as much because we are honestly monitoring that shooting that’s happening right now in Fort Stewart, that base in Georgia. So I don’t want to spend this whole time talking about our 35 years of victory and everything. But we couldn’t be in these court cases. We couldn’t be here providing you this live news coverage, live media coverage without you. We’re not funded by major sponsors. We’re not funded by anyone else. It is all because of ACLJ champions and ACLJ supporters, people that give once or people that give on an ongoing recurring basis. Look, I see Teresa’s a champion. She’s going to get first in line when we take calls coming up here in the next segments. Because when you’re a champion, I make sure you get bumped to the front because you said I’m going to dedicate to give to the organization each and every month. Of course, you cancel any time. But if you become a champion right now, it’s the best time to do it. Your first donation ends up being doubled because another member of the ACLJ, another champion decides I’m going to unlock any donation that comes in, including first time champions. Or if you decide or you had to leave being a champion, you can opt right back in and should do the same thing. Join us for these 35 years of victory, and when we get back, we’ll be taking your calls and comments, and Rick Grinnell will be joining us as well. Second half hour coming up. If you don’t get us on your local station, find us broadcasting live right now at aclj.org, on YouTube, Rumble, or however you get your podcasts.
SPEAKER 03 :
Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Seculo. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 06 :
You know what I love about ACLJ supporters is they take action. Whether it’s something we need to do in media or in the courts, they make sure that things are getting taken care of. And that’s why I’m so appreciative of everyone that supports the ACLJ financially. And of course, those that are ACLJ champions. Welcome to the second half of Sekulow. I did want you to know we are covering the breaking news. If you’re watching live right now, the breaking news is coming out of Georgia. There’s an active shooter situation happening. And Fort Stewart, about an hour outside of Savannah, Georgia. We’ll keep you updated with more information right now. All we know is there appears to be some casualties. There’s no other information that’s happening right now as we do this live. You may be hearing this later on, and obviously this could be completely out of date. But no, right now, if you’re watching between 12 and 1 p.m. Eastern time right now, if it’s at the half hour right now, we’re live. Would you be updated about that? We are going to take calls and comments related to our topic of the day. And that is we are seeing a situation where Texas… Will, why don’t you give them a brief 20 seconds here?
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s right. So Texas has a special legislative session going on right now. And a part of their agenda is approving a new congressional district map. And this is something that states do. They have the authority to do this. They create the districts for their congressional delegation, which goes to the U.S. Congress. The Democrats in Texas are not pleased with this. They are, instead of being there for the special legislative session to vote and vote no, if that is their conscience and what their constituents want them to do, they have fled the state. They have fled to places like Chicago and the state of Illinois to the state of New York where the governor of New York is housing many of them in government facilities there and many other places as well. There’s a report one went overseas. All of this is an attempt to obstruct the official duties of the state legislature. They are trying to make it so that the legislature is crippled and cannot move forward. They cannot do anything because they cannot have a quorum call. A quorum would be enough members there that they can proceed with official business. And that is exactly what they have done thus far. Now you are seeing the governor. The Attorney General, the Speaker of the State Legislature, as well as the U.S. Senator John Cornyn is now calling on the FBI for assistance in getting these rogue members of the legislature back to Texas.
SPEAKER 06 :
We have a lot of supporters in Texas. I want to go to Teresa, who’s an ACLJ champion in Texas, who is taking it into her own hands, which we always love. Teresa, go ahead.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yes, my husband emailed. And I called the rep, my rep in Texas, which is Chris Turner, you know, to express our anger about him running away from Texas to avoid this quorum. What else can we do as individual Texans?
SPEAKER 06 :
Teresa, first of all, how did they respond to your call? Was it just, thank you, we got your information? Were they hostile? What happened?
SPEAKER 11 :
Pretty much, yeah. That’s pretty standard. They took my name, my phone number, where I lived.
SPEAKER 06 :
uh just you know i guess they were being counters okay that’s good you know i actually don’t mind that answer we’ve seen actually a lot more hostility to people calling their representatives right with issues to where you have people who are maybe a little less used to being on the phone or something like that or a new generation of a phone bank screeners or whatever they would be called but like you said bean counters who are sitting there and they’ll get actively upset with the with the person calling in and i’m very actually pleased to hear that your representative treated you with respect that’s the way it’s supposed to be now will what else can they do uh there’s a there’s a lot of things they could do but really it’s uh elections have some consequences here you got to make sure that your your representative is dealing with well and theresa you did the right thing calling your member of your state legislature 95 i’m just gonna throw that number out there it’s not a real number 95 percent of people
SPEAKER 04 :
are not doing that. But Teresa, I’d also say, have conversations with people around you and talk about this, share this broadcast with them to learn about what’s going on. But also, if people don’t like the redistricting process, then they need to be active in their state to change the way that that occurs, not fleeing the state and getting away and absconding their duties and especially going to other states that do the exact same thing, if not worse.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, so get involved locally. That’s a great way to do it. Great advice, Will. When we get back, Rick Grinnell is going to be joining us. We’re going to talk about this topic and more. Of course, I’m sure he’ll have something to say as soon as we mention Gavin Newsom. Phone lines are open at 1-800-684-3110. When we’re done with Rick, we’re going to take all the calls we can. So go get in line right now. We’ll be right back. Welcome back to Secular. We are checking on Rick Grinnell, see if we have him. He’s connecting with us. We got him right now, live via phone right now. Rick, we want to get your thoughts on this. Of course, redistricting has been a hot topic and gerrymandering over the last few days and really over the last 24 hours seems to be dominating the news cycle, including your friend Gavin Newsom. He said, hey, if they’re going to do this, we’re going to do it as well because we need more Democrat districts in California.
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, let’s make one thing very clear. Gavin Newsom is not process in plain politics simply because Texas is doing it. It is exactly because this is what Gavin always does. I don’t think we should be surprised that when politicians have power… They’re going to do everything to help their parties. So we see this from both parties. It goes back and forth constantly. But at some point, I think the states are going to have to take this redistricting out of the hands of their people and make it a process that’s much more geared towards the public.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, and Rick, and many states already have an independent redistricting commission. But as of now, unless your state changes that, it’s up to the state legislature. And people can be upset from Texas that say this isn’t fair. But them fleeing to places like Illinois and New York is just laughable. when those places have been playing this political game for far longer than Republicans even learned how to do it. Unfortunately, for political games, it always seems like conservatives are 15, 20 years behind. But when you see people, one, you had a member of the state legislature in Texas equivocating this to the Holocaust, right? And that’s why they had to flee the state. But then they also say, well, two can play at that game. The hypocrisy is just so stark here that I think this is a moment everyone needs to pay attention to what your politicians are saying, because the rhetoric is getting outrageous.
SPEAKER 09 :
The rhetoric is crazy. And let’s be clear on one thing is that, you know, the Democrats do this all of the time. And Republicans are slow to do it. But when they do do it, they have the media attacking them because obviously we know the media is totally controlled by the Democrats. But I think that both sides are really playing with fire because President Trump is somebody who has been committed to making good decisions that affect the public, not necessarily just one party. And so I could see President Trump jumping in and mandating that these lines that we write are much more common sense geared towards the public and coming up with some sort of a process that takes it out of the politicians hands directly. And I think that the time is coming that we just can’t have this complete manipulation. I saw, you know, all sorts of maps, from years past of how politicians have created congressional district maps that are so crazy looking and it’s all because they just want to manipulate the process and manipulate the census.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, absolutely. We saw that in Illinois. We saw the map where it looks like there’s a river running through the middle of the state throughout the South, and that is because they did not want more Republican areas. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. I did want to give you a quick update on what was going on in Georgia, the active shooter that was happening at Fort Stewart outside of Savannah. There has been an update, and that update is that five soldiers were shot today in an active shooter incident. Again, there’s been casualties, but there’s no fatalities reported yet, no deaths reported. We’ll see if that stays. Hopefully it does, prayerfully. But they have apprehended the shooter. So I wanted to make sure that you know that that part is over. We’ve been covering it as we can. I told you we’d give you updates when they came out and that happened, Will, just the last few minutes.
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s right. And Rick, I do want to shift topics with you just a little bit here as well, because we know today that the U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff was meeting with Vladimir Putin, and that this is ahead of that deadline that was 50 days that got chopped down to 10 days for Russia to make a peace deal when it comes to the war in Ukraine. Just kind of your 30,000-foot view, the Kremlin has already said that it was a constructive meeting. Do you think anything comes out of this? I think it would be hard-pressed to see the Kremlin turn around completely before that first deadline. But as you say, the tactic and tool of diplomacy is always the best first option. I just want to get your take on this.
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, I think Steve is there now because President Trump has decided and seen that that the Russians are manipulating the process. They’re not taking it seriously. It’s really angered President Trump. And I think President Trump is going to try something new here. He shortened the deadline. He’s putting more pressure on Putin to have his actions match his words. And one of the things that I love about President Trump is that you see him in real time. He’s not creating a policy and then walking away and letting the policy linger. He’s watching to see how it’s been implemented. Does it work? And when it doesn’t, he’s the first one to adjust the policy to make sure that that it matches the real world expectations and the reality on the ground. So I’m so thankful that he’s able to do that in real time, do it fast. And we know he’s shortened this deadline. So Steve Witkoff is there to continue that pressure and to say, we’ve got to find a solution. We all know that we need a solution to this war in Ukraine.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, and it’s actually a bit of a relief to see images of Vladimir Putin meeting with Steve Witkoff in person. We’re seeing those together. That is so starkly different of what we’ve had the last four or five years. Now, has it become what we want it to be? Is the war over yet? Not just yet. Hopefully, we’re heading in that direction. But to actually have those moments where you can see our leaders, our diplomats, sitting down with these world leaders, it does feel like a very different time.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah. What we do know is that Putin has accepted the meeting. He’s there with Steve. They’re talking about these issues. That is definitely a first step. Talking is a tactic. And as we know, in the last administration, Joe Biden believed that freezing out Vladimir Putin, not talking to him was something that was. going to be something that would work or or a solution and putin doesn’t care he doesn’t care about the the moral arguments that that we make many of the time and so i like to see whitcoff there and hopefully steve can make some progress and you’ve brought up this point which is that you can be an american and meet with these people and not be there as their friend but be there on a diplomatic mission to get something done to try to get work accomplished uh
SPEAKER 06 :
For some reason, we have pretended like if you could sit down with someone at the table, that means you have to be their best friend. You can go there. We saw what you did in Venezuela and other places around the world. You’ve done some amazing work. And other people have as well. When you can actually just sit down and meet with someone, it doesn’t mean you have to be their friend or their best friend or their buddy. You can actually go in there. Maybe it’s a little stronger when you’re eye to eye.
SPEAKER 09 :
Look, this is something I’m passionate about, which is the idea that talking is a tactic. It’s not the solution. When you show up and you say to somebody, I am here to sit down and discuss this with you. It’s not a reward to sit down and discuss something because actually the conversation might be very tough. If you put President Trump in a room with someone and The message from the messenger is going to be extremely tough. We know it’s going to represent America. It’s going to be an America first agenda. It’s going to be expectations of behavior change. All of that is good. But but this idea that freezing someone out and turning your back and not talking to someone is punishment. I think it only punishes us when we don’t talk to someone because they don’t hear exactly what we expect and how we expect behavior to change.
SPEAKER 04 :
And, Rick, the converse to that is if you aren’t talking, there’s really only a few other options, and those are not the ones that we want to jump to immediately, and that a lot of times is military.
SPEAKER 09 :
Look, well, you’re going to hear from me. I’m a diplomat. I’ve been a diplomat for a very long time. And I always think that there is time for diplomacy. I think that even when diplomacy fails and the military planners are getting ready, I still think you’ve got some time. And we need to be able to have a military that is extremely strong, that doesn’t negotiate, that goes in fast. I get that. But we also need people in America who are the diplomats, who fly immediately into a crisis, who try to talk us down from the situation. And I know this, that President Trump expects there to be a military that doesn’t negotiate and a very tough diplomat who does negotiate. And that’s what I like about President Trump, is he’s able to use both of them. And sometimes you have no idea what he’s going to use, which tool. And the element of surprise is exactly what we want. There’s this whole concept of making sure that your words are credible, a credible means and a credible threat. And Donald Trump definitely has that credibility. You really don’t know what he’s going to do. He just may use one option or the other.
SPEAKER 06 :
All right, thanks, Rick, for joining us today. We always appreciate it. We are celebrating our 35 years of Victory Drive. We’re going to keep talking about that. We’ll talk about it a little bit more in the next segment, how you can reach out and help. I’ll make a donation today, and it has doubled. We’ve got two lines still open at 1-800-684-3110. I’d love to hear from you. That’s, once again, 1-800-684-3110. We’ll be right back with your calls and comments coming right up after this short break. All right, welcome back to Sekulow. I want to hear from you. Now, I did want to give a quick update. Here’s what we know going on at Fort Stewart shooting in Georgia live right now. If you’re watching, again, all of this can be changed by the time you hear from me. Maybe you’re watching on a replay or maybe you’re listening on the podcast later on. The five soldiers have been shot. Currently, right now, the active shooter incident is over. They have… I guess they’ve lifted the lockdown. They’ve lifted the lockdown. We don’t know exactly what happened with the shooter, but we know that he has at least been contained. We don’t know if he’s alive, dead, whatever they had to do. But we know that currently that lockdown is lifted. And right now there are casualties, but there are no fatalities. Five people have been shot, five soldiers. But as of right now, and we prayerfully hope that this stays the case, that they will remain with us because this is just another tragedy that happens on these military bases that we don’t need. It’ll be very interesting to see what unfolds later in the day in terms of motive, reasoning, what’s going on, who did it. We will talk about that, of course, I’m sure, in later broadcasts. Let’s go ahead and get to the phone calls. Will, you had a call you wanted to take early on because you have a direct answer.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, this is Shirley in Indiana who’s watching on the ACLJ app. Yeah, we don’t talk about that enough. If you don’t have the ACLJ app, download it in the App Store. It’s on both Android and Apple devices. It’s a great tool, and Shirley is using it. So, Shirley, welcome to Seculo. You’re on the air.
SPEAKER 01 :
Yes, I just had a thought and an idea that for these people that have left the state of Texas because they don’t want to vote online, want to hold up the vote on the redistricting and everything, these Democrats, and even if it had been Republicans who would do this kind of thing, why can’t, is there something in place in the state where they can just refuse to pay them from the moment they left, that they don’t get paid for their position of serving the public there, they don’t get paid for that until they come back, or that there’s some type of financial process or something that
SPEAKER 04 :
something against them that they don’t get paid well surely actually it’s great you brought this up because and this is the case in many states as well but a lot of times state lawmakers do not make very much money at all for the love of the game it’s not their only job most of them have outside jobs that’s why places like texas they don’t have a year-round session uh they only in they can call special sessions but so financially getting up and leaving Not a big deal. Well, and so they only make about $600 per month, but then while they’re in session, so currently they would get a stipend of $221 a day. Now they are being subjected to fines of $500 every day. So they are losing more money each day by not being there through these fines than they are making. So their paycheck is effectively taken away as well as they’re having to put out more money as well. But also a lot of these people, if they fled the state and they have a second job, I was reading some articles how they’re saying that’s where the pain for a lot of these members will start to hit is when they’re like, I got to get back to in this special session so I can go back to work so I can feed my family. So this political stunt that they’re pulling does have some real cost to them. that to be willing to do it. But at the end of the day, uh, we, we will see, I think a resolution to this before too long.
SPEAKER 06 :
Let’s go ahead and continue on. We’ll go to those who’ve been able to hold the longest. Let’s go to Bob, who is in Wisconsin, listening on the radio, Bob, go ahead.
SPEAKER 10 :
Thank you. Um, thank you guys for everything you do. Um, I got, now I got two questions. Go ahead. The first one is, is can anybody be criminally charged for leaving the state of Texas and or removed from office? The second one is anybody like in New York or Illinois that is hoping these people be charged with aiding and abiding.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, Bob, what’s interesting is what we’re seeing is that the governor, as well as the attorney general of the state, are already pursuing having these members removed from office, saying that they have abandoned their office by doing this. That would be, I believe, up to the state Supreme Court. So we’ll see how that plays out. I don’t know that there’s a clear-cut answer. And I’m sure that the defense of those individuals would be like, we didn’t abandon our office. We just were not going along with this.
SPEAKER 01 :
Who’s up fourth?
SPEAKER 04 :
So we’ll see how that plays out. I’m not sure about the makeup of the Texas Supreme Court and how that will play out. But as well, that is interesting you bring up that because I don’t know about the other elected officials, but there have been individuals that covered flights. There was an individual on X that was proudly saying he covered a private charter of a plane to get people out of the states and that John Cornyn is asking for it to be looked into by the FBI as well as state. issues that concern legislators who solicited or accepted funds to aid in their efforts to avoid their legislative duties may be guilty of bribery or other public corruption offenses, effectively taking money or benefit. in order to vote or not vote a certain way. That’s not legal in this United States, and therefore they may be guilty of something of that by using funds and getting help from the outside for them to flee and not be able to vote.
SPEAKER 06 :
President Obama said that this is a power grab that undermines our democracy.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay. All right, I think he has bigger issues to worry about right now. Right, ketchup, treasonous conspiracies, things of that nature.
SPEAKER 06 :
Man, every time I have my kids eat ketchup, I’m like, you’ve already gone over the limit. My kids are nine. They can’t eat ketchup anymore. Let’s continue on. Let’s go to Nancy, who is calling in North Carolina. You’re on the air.
SPEAKER 12 :
Hi. I am struck by the fact that Speaker Johnson shut down the House two weeks early to avoid having the Jeffrey Epstein file voted on whether or not to release those. So I think the hypocrisy pretty much goes both ways as far as that. Also, redistricting is usually tied to the census, which is every 10 years. And I think this five-year preemptive strike, so to speak, is just because they suspect that the Republicans are going to lose seats in the House. So it shouldn’t be done on a partisan basis of, you know, redistricting just to, you know, create new districts so that you can retain control. It should be a nonpartisan committee that redraws every 10 years based upon the census data.
SPEAKER 04 :
Nancy, one, I mean, very well thought out and very – I agree with a lot of what you said. One, yes, there’s one thing you can say about members of Congress, members of state legislatures. In politics, there is hypocrisy. I don’t know that I would draw the same distinction of members trying to not allow a quorum to be called as well as the Speaker of the House going to recess early to avoid other political tricks, but – I understand that point.
SPEAKER 06 :
I’d actually like to get to Jerry because it kind of ties in, Nancy, to your comment as well. I want to make sure we get to him because he’s been home for a while. Watch it on Salem News Channel. Jerry, go ahead and then we’ll kind of answer those questions together.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hey, real quick, Jordan, been a big fan of you and your dad for years. And I called on the gerrymandering. I just want to make a quick salient point on the Fort Stewart shooting that when I was in the military, we didn’t have shootings like that on our bases until Bill Clinton passed a law that said that senior enlisted and officers could not carry on the base unless they were actually, you know, guarding something.
SPEAKER 06 :
I am certainly not cutting you off for that. We only got about 55 seconds till we’re off air. So go ahead quickly with your comment.
SPEAKER 08 :
On the gerrymandering, I’m not a fan. It happens here in North Carolina. And one of the things that I think is, you know, we need to take it out of the hands of the politicians, like Rick Grinnell said. And why not, with all the technology we have, why don’t we just build a computer program that just takes the population centers and divides it up evenly?
SPEAKER 06 :
This is pretty antiquated. We don’t necessarily say one way or the other on your feelings on gerrymandering, but I understand not being for it. We’ve discussed that as well. It’s just when there’s situations like this and it’s become the industry standard, if you will, and now you have people leaving their posts, it’s also not good. We need to make sure we clean that up as well. All right, that’s going to do it for today’s show. Support the work of the ACLJ during our 35 years of Victory Drive. Have your gifts doubled right now at aclj.org slash victory. And we’ve had a lot of big wins over the last 35 years, and we want to continue on with that work. We can’t do it without you. Talk to you tomorrow.
