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On today’s program: Ken Cuccinelli, Senior Fellow for Homeland Security and Immigration for the Center for Renewing America, reacts to the president’s plans to deploy the National Guard in Washington, D.C., to combat crime. Pat Harrigan, U.S.
SPEAKER 15 :
from the heart of our nation’s capital in Washington, D.C., bringing compelling interviews, insightful analysis, taking you beyond the headlines and soundbites into conversations with our nation’s leaders and newsmakers, all from a biblical worldview. Sitting in for Tony is today’s host, Jody Heiss.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, good afternoon. So glad to have you joining us today for this Monday edition of Washington Watch. I am Jody Heiss, Senior Fellow here at the Family Research Council, and an honor indeed to be filling in for Tony this month. All right, we’ve got a lot to bring your way today. We’ll start with President Trump. He began this week with a press conference where he made several really big announcements. Chief among those is the fact that he is now going to be deploying the National Guard in Washington, D.C. He’s also going to be putting the D.C. Police Department under direct federal control.
SPEAKER 06 :
I’m announcing a historic action to rescue our nation’s capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor, and worse. This is Liberation Day in D.C., and we’re going to take our capital back. We’re taking it back.
SPEAKER 08 :
Ken Cuccinelli will be joining me here in just a moment to react to this news and to break down what this likely would mean and what it would look like in practice. And also this morning, President Trump shared more about his upcoming summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding the Russia-Ukraine war.
SPEAKER 06 :
I thought it was very respectful that the president of Russia is coming to our country as opposed to us going to his country or even a third party place. But I think we’ll have constructive conversations. The next meeting will be with Zelensky and Putin or Zelensky and Putin and me. I’ll be there if they need. But I want to have a meeting set up between the two leaders.
SPEAKER 08 :
Congressman Pat Harrigan will be here in just a few moments to preview the meeting between these two presidents as they will be face-to-face in Alaska. We’ll also hear part of Tony’s conversation with former Ambassador John Bolton this week on Capitol Hill regarding the high stakes involved as Vladimir Putin and Trump meet later this week. And then we’ll close the program today by taking a look at the long-standing violence against Christians in the African country of Mozambique, and then we will examine the state of religious liberty right here at home. Travis Weber, FRC’s Vice President for Policy and Government Affairs, will be joining me for that discussion, and he’ll shine a light on FRC’s newest addition, the hostility against churches in the United States. That report was released this morning. So as always, we’ve got a lot to come your way in the next hour. I hope you don’t miss any part of it, but if by chance you do, you can go back and catch it at our website, TonyPerkins.com. By the way, that is a great website for lots of resources as well as archives of this program. Also want to encourage you, I’ll speak a little bit more about this later, but our upcoming program, PrayVote Stand Summit is going to be taking place in October 17th and 18th in Chino Hills, California. You can check out some more information right now by visiting PrayVoteStand.org for more details. All right, let’s jump into today’s program. President Trump, as I mentioned a moment ago, He started this Monday with a bang, literally by announcing major, major news. The president declared a public safety emergency in our nation’s capital, Washington, D.C. And of course, there have been… For a long time, all sorts of violent crime taking place, but it seems lately there’s just been a string of high-profile violent crimes that have rocked the city, including the botched hijacking attempt where a former Doge member was brutally attacked. But the question is, what’s the legal reasoning behind all of this? And I don’t know of anyone better suited to discuss this than Ken Cuccinelli. He’s former Attorney General of Virginia. He currently serves as a Senior Fellow for Homeland Security and Immigration at the Center for Renewing America. Ken, welcome back to Washington Watch. It’s an honor to have you. Thanks for coming on.
SPEAKER 04 :
Good to be with you, as always, Jody.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right, so let’s talk about this declaration, the president declaring a crime emergency here in the District of Columbia. Do you agree with him? Is it a good direction where he’s going here?
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, certainly, Jody, we all remember back in the campaign, he was talking about how out of control cities were getting. on the criminal front and that he was going to confront it. Well, there is no city in America where he has more legal authority to do that than Washington DC, the nation’s capital, because it’s not a state. It is a federal district under the Constitution. There is an awful lot of federal authority. available to him, and he’s using a good bit of it. He’s got the Metropolitan Police now under Attorney General Bondi’s control for the next 30 days, and he’s mobilizing 800 National Guardsmen, both of which are indisputably within his authority to do. And we will see how effective they are at reducing crime in Washington, D.C. And the president is very determined about this, not just in Washington, but around the country. But as I said, Washington, D.C. is the city where he has the most legal authority to act. And so he is, as is his habit, taking full advantage of it.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, I’m glad you brought that up because that was one of my first. I know Washington, D.C. is a federal city and there’s constitutionally Congress and the federal government has jurisdiction, but I also know that a lot of that has been given back through home rule back to the city government of Washington, D.C. So I’m glad you brought up the legal underpinnings that support this executive order. So you feel very confident that the president is solely within his legal jurisdiction to do this?
SPEAKER 04 :
Not only do I, Jody, the mayor of D.C. has already conceded, look, I have to obey this order. I don’t have any other choice. So when you have a local Democrat mayor conceding the legal point, I think that that makes it clear the president is on very firm ground, indisputable ground. And I would point out as a former Virginia attorney general that The crime coming out of DC is a long time problem. It is a regional source of crime, and that hasn’t really abated. There’s a lot of people you look at the Washington Post, for instance, today will say, well, crime’s at its lowest and however long. That’s a real debatable question in Washington, D.C., and the murder rate is high. There’s plenty of violent crime there. It’s a nation’s capital, and the president wants it to be a showcase of a city in America, not just good enough. And he’s putting it anywhere his mouth is.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, absolutely. I was looking over this order earlier today, Ken, and it references Section 740 of the District of Columbia Self-Government and Governmental Organizational Act. Can you explain what that is?
SPEAKER 04 :
Sure. So as you mentioned, Jody, and for viewers, Washington, D.C. has only had what’s called home rule for the last 50 years or so. And before that, it was simply managed as a federal district. It now has a city council and a mayor and so forth. But in establishing what’s called home rule, Congress maintains certain federal powers. For example, the Congress can override Washington, D.C. laws as they did two years ago. Andrew Clyde, your former colleague from Georgia, led that effort to get rid of some soft on crime legislation that they had passed. And it was so bad that even Democrats on Capitol Hill supported getting rid of it. So those kinds of federal levers continue to exist, and one of them is the authority of the president on the declaration of an emergency, and the president declared an emergency based on crime today, to take over the Metropolitan Police for a period of 30 days. Now, if Congress acts, that can be longer than 30 days, but of course the president can also bring to bear uh law enforcement officers from the department of justice the department of homeland security in certain respects and so forth so there’s an awful lot of available federal buttressing of the law enforcement situation that’s available to the president that is not available to the mayor of washington dc under the home rule statutes that congress put in place 52 years ago if i remember correctly
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay, well, let’s kind of break this down. You say he has control of the D.C. Metro Police Department for 30 days. What is this going to look like? I would imagine it’s going to be a pretty busy 30 days for this administration to put a lot of things in order.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, one would expect… That’s what I would expect. Attorney General Bondi has been delegated the president’s authority to lead the department effectively. And so the the Metropolitan Police will take instructions from the attorney general now. And she, of course, also has authority over all of the law enforcement officers of the Department of Justice, whether that’s the marshals or the FBI, DEA and so forth, and many of which have jurisdiction in DC, meaning if you’re the Drug Enforcement Agency, all you have to be doing is pursuing the violation of drug laws and you have jurisdiction. FBI has general jurisdiction. Again, remember, DC isn’t a state. So where the FBI might need some interstate element of crime, in Virginia to have jurisdiction, they don’t need that in Washington, D.C. They can literally act as local cops if that’s what the president and the attorney general choose to do. So I do expect the next 30 days to be a lot busier. hopefully productive, of rounding up people who’ve been committing crimes with relative ease in Washington, D.C., and we’ll all be able to celebrate a safer Capitol come 30 days. Now, I would say this isn’t the 30 and done. I’m sure the president is looking at this long term, but he does have that 30-day control position over the Metropolitan Police that reverts back to DC in the absence of congressional action. So it’s gonna be a busy four weeks or so.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, I agree with you. And very interesting, your comments there, Ken. I really appreciate that. But beyond the Metropolitan Police, as you mentioned, there are other law enforcement options, such as the National Guard. You mentioned about 800 of them. What will they be tasked with? What will they be doing?
SPEAKER 04 :
You can expect… Just like in LA, they tend to be supportive. While the president can use them for law enforcement, he has not so far done that. But he has that option, not just in DC, but there’s a lawsuit being tried today in San Francisco on his deployment of the National Guard in California. And he has broad authority in that respect. And it’s something where you can expect, I think he’s gonna win that case. He’ll lose in front of this judge. So left wing San Francisco judge, but the ninth circuit will undoubtedly give the president the win. And that’s gonna solidify his authority to use similar tactics in any city in the country. But again, in D.C., because he has additional authority, because it’s a federal district, he’s starting here, which is what I would do operationally if I were him. I think it’s very smart and it is incumbent on him to perform, if you will, meaning on Attorney General Bondi and the whole team to show results. which will legitimize from a policy and political standpoint his aggressiveness with other cities other than Washington, D.C. So I look forward to that success.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, it’s absolutely fascinating. And I want to thank you, Ken Cuccinelli, for your valuable insight into this major executive order from the Trump administration today. Deeply appreciate you joining us on Washington Watch.
SPEAKER 04 :
Always good to be with you, Jody.
SPEAKER 08 :
Thank you, buddy. All right, friends, coming up next, Congressman Pat Harrigan is going to be joining me with all the latest regarding the upcoming summit between President Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, as well as what’s happening in Israel in Hamas wars. So much more coming your way right after the break. So stay tuned. We’ll be back.
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SPEAKER 08 :
Good afternoon. Happy Monday to you. And welcome back to Washington Watch. I’m Jody Heiss filling in today for Tony. Well, this coming Friday, August 15th, President Trump will be meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In Alaska, now the specific location in Alaska for them to meet has not yet been announced, but seemingly it was determined to be in Alaska as kind of a halfway middle ground between Washington, D.C. and Moscow. But what will the… central points of discussion between those two be? We can imagine certainly the centerpiece of it will be regarding the war with Ukraine, but just how far is this going to go? Well, joining me now to discuss a potential preview is Congressman Pat Harrigan. He’s a member of the House Armed Services Committee, as well as the Science, Space, and Technology Committee. He’s a former Green Beret, served with great valor in our armed services. He represents the 10th Congressional District of North Carolina. Congressman Harrigan, welcome back to Washington, D.C. Great to have you.
SPEAKER 22 :
Jody, it’s great to be with you. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, it’s our privilege in every way. All right, so let’s look at a little preview at the meeting between Trump and Putin. What do you anticipate this conversation basically consisting of? What’s going to be the focus?
SPEAKER 22 :
Well, I think it’s certainly gonna be one to watch, and it’s hard to tell whether this is another delay tactic from Vladimir Putin and the Russians, or if President Trump is genuinely about to notch his eighth peace deal in eight months. Nobody knows, and time will play out here. I tend to believe that it is not in Russia’s best interest to end this conflict. I think the purposes for which they are fighting are not really well understood by the West. And I think because of that, it’s very likely that this is a delay or stall tactic. But I think that on the off chance that we might get something out of this, because certainly it is absolutely in the best interest of the United States of America for this conflict to end, we need to full-throated support President Trump and his endeavors to end this conflict. And so definitely will be something to watch as this week progresses.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, I agree with you. I think that’s a really good insight, too, of another potential stall task. In fact, President Trump literally made a similar pointing, I guess, in that direction, saying he would probably know within the first couple of minutes where this whole meeting was going to go. But what do you think Putin’s goal is going to be in this meeting? I mean, you mentioned stall, but He may not be able to accomplish a great deal of that, or maybe he can. What do you think Putin’s going to try to get out of this?
SPEAKER 22 :
I think Vladimir Putin’s going to try to achieve the strategic objectives of Russia. I don’t think we should anticipate that his goal would be anything other than that. And my concern stems from the fact that I think their strategic interest is actually keeping us engaged in this conflict longer. every day that they fire fifty thousand dollar drones that elicits a million dollar american missile response is a day that we lose the economics of war and russia and xi working together push the united states closer and closer to a fiscal cliff that nobody knows exactly where it is but they know which direction it is in and so i’m very concerned that russia and and and China are working together to effectuate effectively the financial takedown of the United States, much the exact same thing that Ronald Reagan worked against the Soviet Union 30 plus years ago. I think we need to be cognizant of the fact that that might be going on right now.
SPEAKER 08 :
So if that is the case, what should the U.S. role be in a potential sustained peace between Russia and Ukraine? Or should there not really be much of a sustained role from the U.S. and that be left more up to Europe to take responsibility?
SPEAKER 22 :
I think President Trump’s taken the right angle on this, which is he wants peace. I think that’s certainly in the best interest of the United States. It’s also in the best interest of the West. There’s no question about that because as we have become very dependent on highly capable, but very exquisite, very expensive, military end items when we provide those end items to our allies, the 50 different nations that purchase military equipment from us. Yes, they become very capable. But if that war goes on for a protracted period of time, they also start losing the economics of war right alongside of us. And so we’ve got to be cognizant that we may, based on the technology that we end up transferring both to Ukraine but also to our allies, that we end up hanging a financial millstone around their necks. just as we’re hanging a financial millstone around our own necks. I think that Russia is very knowledgeable of this fact. And if we can get a piece to play out here that’s absolutely in our best interest, if we can’t, we have to figure out a more cost-effective way of achieving America’s strategic interests vis-a-vis what’s going on in Eastern Europe right now.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right. Are you concerned that Zelensky is not here? And let’s be quick on that, because I want to get your thoughts in just a couple of minutes we have left on what’s happening in Israel. Are you concerned Zelensky is not going to be part of this?
SPEAKER 22 :
I am, and I’m also not simultaneously. I am from the perspective that every time America or The West had to negotiate something on behalf of a third party in history. It has never worked out well. Simultaneously, I don’t think that it’s inappropriate for Zelensky to be asking for a seat at the table, given the fact it’s his country. That being said, we are the largest benefactor and contributor to their ongoing war effort. And so I fully understand President Trump’s position. I think it’s very tough. I don’t think that there’s actually a real right answer here. I think that it becomes clearer what that right answer should be if Vladimir Putin actually comes to the table desiring a peace this Friday.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay, and real quickly, lastly, only about a minute or so left, your thoughts on Benjamin Netanyahu moving into Gaza City?
SPEAKER 22 :
Boy, I’ll tell you, this is a really tough one too. It’s kind of a catch-22 because Netanyahu and Israel are really down to no good options, in my opinion. If they continue to move towards a peace the way it is, they’re going to continue perpetually experience the cycle of violence they have experienced with unrepentant terrorism for the last 40 years. If they go into Gaza, which it looks like they want to do, they’re going to have a massive insurgency on their hands. And I think history has proven it is Very, very, very difficult to quell an insurgency, if not genuinely impossible, particularly over a protracted period of time. I don’t think Netanyahu has any good options here. I think that he’s making the.
SPEAKER 08 :
Right. Thank you, Congressman Pat Harrigan. We’ve got to leave it right there. Thank you for joining us on Washington Watch. All right, friends, on the other side of the break, we’ll hear some of Tony’s This Week on Capitol Hill interview with Ambassador John Bolton and their thoughts about the upcoming meeting between Trump and Putin. So much more coming your way right after the break.
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SPEAKER 08 :
Welcome back to Washington Watch. Glad to have you joining us today. All right, last week, Tony interviewed former National Security Advisor and U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., John Bolton. That was on his weekly show this week on Capitol Hill. And the two of them talked about the Russia news and the upcoming meeting between Trump and President Vladimir Putin. which again is happening this Friday in Alaska. And I want to share part of that conversation with you right now, starting with Tony’s question on Russia’s influence on nations like India, which President Trump, of course, last week ramped up tariff threats against over its purchase of Russian oil.
SPEAKER 10 :
Could Russia’s influence in the region and in Europe be further maybe dial back a bit as the outcome, as we negotiate an outcome to this ceasefire with Ukraine?
SPEAKER 12 :
Well, it could be if the negotiations led to something that was favorable to Ukraine. And that’s what we don’t know. I think that what Putin wants to do at this upcoming meeting is try and restore his relationship with Trump. I think whether he intended it or not, Putin obviously pushed beyond the envelope of what Trump was willing to accept. And I think Putin wants to repair that. And I think he will try and gain the advantage over Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, perhaps by presenting the Russian peace plan, so-called, for a solution to the war, or at least something in the nature of a ceasefire so that Putin can say to Trump, see, I’m with you on this, and try and paint Zelensky and Ukraine as the obstructionists.
SPEAKER 10 :
Well, that might play into what we saw before, where it appeared that Donald Trump was kind of more aligned with Vladimir Putin than Zelensky. Could they reemerge as more of, you know, friendly alliances?
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, I think that’s what Putin’s going to try and do. Trump said many, many times he and Putin were friends. He said several times recently he’s disappointed in Putin, but he hasn’t rejected the friendship. So I think Putin needs somehow to repair the damage, but also set the stage for advancing whatever negotiations are going to follow here in a direction that’s consistent with Russia. And he’s achieved one objective already, because it will simply be Trump and Putin in this first meeting. No European leaders, nobody else, just the two of them. so that former KGB agent Putin can see what he can do in that kind of setting.
SPEAKER 10 :
So, Ambassador, what are the potential pitfalls here that the Trump administration should be watching out for?
SPEAKER 12 :
Well, I think we don’t want to disadvantage Ukraine. They’re the ones who had aggression committed against them, and they’re the ones who are fighting for their freedom and independence. So I think we need to be very careful not to put them in a hard position right at the beginning of the talks.
SPEAKER 10 :
Going back to my question about Russia, their influence, it has waned a bit when they have taken on Ukraine. They have not been able to reestablish their influence. at least their extension of control over that region. I know they want to reestablish at least the influence of the USSR. Could this set them back and call some of these other countries that they hope to bring or they had hoped to bring under their influence more aggressive freedom to join the West?
SPEAKER 12 :
Well, I think that should be our objective. And I think we’ve also got to keep in mind not just the politics of Eastern and Central Europe, which are very important to the United States, but China as well. China’s been a bigger aider of Russia in this aggression against Ukraine than India. I mean, India purchasing oil and gas, obviously that’s not helpful, including laundering sanctioned Russian financial assets through its opaque financial system out into international markets. And we’re in a very strange position here where the U.S. has sanctioned India for purchasing Russian oil and gas but has not yet sanctioned China. which has really agitated the Indians quite a bit, as you can imagine, and I think left Ukraine wondering where they stand in that calculus. So I think we need from the administration a better explanation of what their strategy is, how these pieces fit together. Honestly, at this point, we don’t see one.
SPEAKER 10 :
There has been the threat of additional tariffs on China, but they’ve not happened. Why do you think that is?
SPEAKER 12 :
I’m worried about that. I know a number of China experts think that the negotiations are pointing in the direction of lenient treatment for China. I think that’s a mistake. There’s talk. Their deadline is August the 12th, so it’s coming up fairly rapidly. But a lot of talk of another 90-day extension while the negotiations continue. And I can tell you from our experience in the first term, the Chinese are very good at doing what Trump calls tap, tap, tapping along. delaying and delaying, which fits into their objectives. So we’ve got to get a better sense of what the goals are here so we can measure our performance.
SPEAKER 10 :
About 40 seconds left, Ambassador, but if we’re able to resolve this conflict in Ukraine, it allows us to focus more on China?
SPEAKER 12 :
It does. And I think that’s why those sort of of the isolationist stripe out there who say we should forget about Europe, forget about the Middle East, just worry about China, ignore the fact that if we can actually bring productive solutions in Europe, in the Middle East, ending Iran’s nuclear and terrorist threat, then we’ll have more time and attention to be able to devote to China, which is the main threat we’re facing.
SPEAKER 10 :
Ambassador, always great to talk with you. Thanks so much for joining us.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, that was part of Tony’s conversation with former National Security Advisor and U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., John Bolton. That was on the weekend program, This Week on Capitol Hill. By the way, if you’d like to catch more of that, you can go to thisweekoncapitolhill.com and catch more of it. Fascinating discussion. All right, coming up, we’re going to take a look at the state of religious freedom around the world. We’ll begin by looking at the African nation of Mozambique, and then we’ll turn our eyes right here domestically. So Ambassador Alberto Fernandez will join me, as well as Travis Weber. So stay tuned. Very serious conversation coming up right after the break.
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Family Research Council is committed to advancing faith, family, and freedom from the East Coast to the West. So FRC is going to Southern California for this year’s Pray, Vote, Stand Summit, October 17th and 18th at Calvary Chapel, Chino Hills. Join us for this powerful gathering of Christians desiring cultural renewal and spiritual revival. The Pray, Vote, Stand Summit brings together Christian leaders, issue experts, and government officials for a time of prayer, inspiration, and action. Together, we will seek God’s guidance for our nation and engage in meaningful discussions on the intersection of faith, government, and culture. If the spiritual foundations and the cultural walls of our nation are to be rebuilt, we all have a role to play. May we each find our place on the wall as we build for biblical truth. Register now at PrayVoteStand.org. That’s PrayVoteStand.org.
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How should Christians think about the thorny issues shaping our culture? How should Christians address deceitful ideas like transgenderism, critical theory, or assisted suicide? How can Christians navigate raising children in a broken culture, the war on gender roles, or rebuilding our once great nation? Outstanding is a podcast from The Washington Stand dedicated to these critical conversations. Outstanding seeks to tear down what our corrupt culture lifts up with an aim to take every thought and every idea captive to the obedience of Christ. Whether policies or partisan politics, whether conflict in America or conflict abroad, join us and our guests as we examine the headlines through the lens of Scripture and explore how Christians can faithfully exalt Christ in all of life. Follow Outstanding on your favorite podcast app and look for new episodes each week.
SPEAKER 08 :
Welcome back to Washington Watch and good afternoon to you. I’m Jody Heiss, an honor today to be filling in for Tony. And before we dive into this last segment, I just want to again underscore for you and encourage you to join FRC and other like-minded believers from all across the country for our upcoming PrayVote Stand Summit. It’s taking place October 17th and 18th in Chino Hills, California. And friends, I can’t tell you just the power behind this event. It is really a transformational event. You’ll be there with Christian leaders, with issue experts, government leaders, lots of spiritual impacting moments of inspiration, prayer, and action items. So I encourage you, if you’ve not already registered, I want to deeply encourage you to go ahead and do so. Or if you just want to get some more information, check it out at PrayVoteStand.org. PrayVoteStand.org. Okay, earlier this month, the Islamic State Terror Group released some horrifying and graphic photos that documented their attacks on several Christian villages in Mozambique. It is a chilling, chilling reminder of the international terror group, ISIS, and the the fact that they are still capable of inflicting deep pain and death, particularly upon Christians and other religious minorities. And of course, we’re focusing to begin with here on the continent of Africa. But We have to be informed of this so that we can pray and so that we can be engaged here. And how can our federal government potentially help stem the violence that’s taking place there? Well, joining me now with his expertise is Ambassador Alberto Fernandez. He is now serving as vice president of the Middle East Media Research Institute. Ambassador Fernandez, welcome to Washington Watch. It’s a deep honor to have you here with us.
SPEAKER 03 :
Thank you so much, and it’s an honor to be on with you.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, first of all, for those perhaps, in fact, I was talking with someone earlier just a couple of days ago who has not been tracking the situation in Africa, in Mozambique. Can you kind of break that down for us? What’s going on there, particularly as it relates to the Christian community?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, first of all, I think you have to put Mozambique or what’s happening there within the context of what’s happening throughout the continent of Africa, which is there is a jihadist offensive going across thousands of miles of contact from West Africa, from Mali and Nigeria, through Central Africa, through the Democratic Republic of Congo, down to Mozambique. This is a huge front line. This is much larger than, you know, the front lines of other conflicts we’re seeing in the world. And while it’s a conflict between terrorist groups and governments, these terrorist groups, all of them jihadist groups, not all of them the Islamic State, are all focused, among other things, on killing Christians. And certainly that is very much happening in Mozambique.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yes, absolutely. It’s just horrifying what we’re seeing there. So this is a pervasive problem from what you’re describing. Is the government there in Mozambique doing anything to stop this from happening?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, the government is trying. The challenge, of course, is that African countries, not all of them, but many of them, are not necessarily well-governed, well-administered countries. And so, for example, the military in Mozambique is not a well-prepared one. And the terrorists take advantage of specific areas where they’re in, where there is, say, a larger Muslim population where they can hide and where they can work from. Mozambique is a majority Christian country, but the north is a majority Muslim, like barely, like 55% Muslim. so they go in these safe havens and they come down now the Mozambicans have received help from other countries from other African countries the Rwandan army which is a very good army is there but you know these governments uh they’re poor governments they have uh limited resources uh and so a bloody brutal terrorist insurgency is very difficult for them to uh to take care of. And in Mozambique in particular, the terrorists have disrupted a tremendous potential source of wealth that exists in Mozambique, large natural gas deposits, which they can’t access to help their country, to make their country more successful because of these terrorist attacks.
SPEAKER 08 :
So what can the, these are poor countries and poor governments don’t really have the resources you described. So what can the Trump administration potentially do to help resolve all of this?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, obviously, we can’t resolve all the world’s problems, and I’m one of those that strongly believes that the administration is correct in kind of being very careful about prioritizing our resources and our wealth and our military, not just going all over the place with no plan. But certainly… looking at targeted, narrowly focused ways to help friendly African governments that face the threat of jihadist terror, whether that’s by American airstrikes or drone strikes or supplying training and weapons to specific militaries or working with, as I mentioned with Miranda, working with other governments that can do some of the heavy lifting. But unfortunately, this massive jihadist conflict, as I said, stretching from West Africa all the way to South Africa is… is huge and yet mostly discounted. It doesn’t get 1 10th or 1 100th of the attention of Gaza or Ukraine. And yet the numbers are actually quite large of people having their lives destroyed or being killed.
SPEAKER 08 :
So what about the United Nations? Can the United Nations do anything to help mitigate what’s happening there?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, the United Nations is only as good as those countries that support it. And the United Nations is more of a talking shop than anything else. I think that help is going to come from countries that have serious interests. So the United States is certainly one of them. Regional powers that are concerned by this growing threat because it’s not going to stay there. Both in Mozambique and in West Africa, they’re pushing south. They’re pushing from areas where there are lots of Muslims and even Muslim majorities, and they’re pushing farther and farther south to zones that are completely Christian areas. So the horrors that we’re seeing today if we do nothing, if we’re not strong enough, are only going to get worse in the months and the year to come.
SPEAKER 08 :
Thank you so much, Ambassador Alberto Fernandez, for bringing this to light, a disturbing, disturbing trim taking place there across Africa and in particular Mozambique. We deeply appreciate you coming on and highlighting this for us. Thank you.
SPEAKER 03 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right, if I can now shift gears, I want to bring this whole discussion of religious liberty and hostility to Christianity closer to home here, right here in the United States. FRC has a brand new edition of our report, Hostility Against Churches in the United States. and is looking back at incidences of religious hostility, religious freedom hostility, during the last calendar year of 2024. And here now to share more is Travis Weber. He is the Vice President for Policy and Government Affairs here at FRC. Travis, welcome back to Washington Watch. Always great to see you. Jody, thanks for having me on. All right. So we’ve got a brand new report out. But first of all, let’s start with, I guess, previous iterations of this report. What have we seen in the past and what trends have we seen in the last few years?
SPEAKER 23 :
Yeah, so I think if we’re looking at the data here that we’ve gathered in terms of acts of hostility directed at churches in the United States since we started examining this problem in 2022, we observe largely the same sort of incidents, the same types of incidents, and even generally, the same percentages of attacks being occupied by the same type of incidents. For example, vandalism predominantly the primary act of hostility that we see occurring more so than gun related incidents or other types of attacks. But Jody, what we observe over that time period since 2022 is a market uptick in the number of incidents. This year there were 415 incidents and in 2023 there were 485. Now that’s a slight dip, both still very high numbers over 400. And I think it’s incredibly concerning in the United States in 2025 that there are this many attacks on places of Christian worship, on churches. And so what we’ve seen, though, in our reporting is in 2018, we have 50 incidents. The next year, 2019, 83, 55 in 2020, 98 in 2021. And then in 2023, as we measure that, 485 and 415 this past year of 2024 in the calendar year. So we see a significant uptick, even though there was a slight dip this last year.
SPEAKER 08 :
Is there any idea whatsoever what caused that uptick? I mean, what changed in our country to bring such hostility to Christianity? Do we have any idea?
SPEAKER 23 :
We can surmise, you know, but what we examine in this report is publicly available incidents, whether in the news or other public sources about assaults or hostility that occurred against churches. So we don’t know what ultimately happened with these incidents in terms of whether they were prosecuted, to what extent. whether the perpetrators face justice or not. We also do not know in this report about incidents that were not otherwise publicly reported, may have occurred, may have never been reported anywhere just by anyone. So those incidents are still out there. So, Jody, what we did is we gathered that information, analyzed it, so we observed different types of incidents and different motives. Some, you know, the motive is more clear. There was perhaps a grudge animosity directed at a specific church that the individual may have had some interactions with in the past. In other cases, It may be more random, opportunistic theft or vandalism from youth just with too much time on their hands and the evil inclinations that we are all subject to finding their way in manifesting in this activity against churches. And so the answer to your question is we don’t know, but we want to bring attention and light to the very fact that this is happening in the United States and it’s on the upswing. hostility on the life issue directed at churches perceived as being pro-life or being representing the pro-life position. That was the year the Dobbs case was decided over turning row. That anti-life activism and motive has subsided since then somewhat, but the overall picture, so we observe some smaller trends in the larger picture of what happened, but the overall picture, we don’t know. The best that we can do is we look at what’s happening, identify different motives at play, but really our aim here is to bring attention to the fact that in a country like the United States, where many of us think of ourselves as Western, freedom-loving, free country, you’ve got peaceful places of worship being attacked in this way. It’s unacceptable and we need to bring it to a light and address it.
SPEAKER 08 :
So what do you think this tells us overall about the state of religious liberty here in the United States?
SPEAKER 23 :
Yeah, I mean, Jody, I think what this tells us is that not everyone out there loves the Christian faith, loves Christians and Christian places of worship that represent the Christian faith. We specifically focused on Christian places of worship, churches, and we recognize there are other similar trends out there. You know, anti-Semitism is a topic we also care about. We want to see that addressed. There are groups documenting acts of hostility against the Jewish community, but we’re focused on the Christian community. So we want to address any activity, any violence directed at people peacefully practicing their faith. But Jody, to our report focused on churches, I think the data show us that you have enough hostility in our culture to find its way into the form of 415 hostile actions directed at peaceful places of worship in the calendar year 2024. That’s what we know. That’s a problem that’s concerning because it is almost certainly the case that there’s more more incidents out there that we did not find that are maybe unreported and what never found its way into a hostile act but is represented in the culture out there brewing perhaps in a person’s heart, thoughts, intentions, some hatred that has yet to find its way out. It’s the government’s job to prosecute the actions. But I’m pointing this out because what we see on the surface represents something that is under the surface. And so I think anyone who loves freedom and loves freedom of religion in the United States, it’s a good time to reflect on this as we approach our 250th birthday of our country next year. We celebrate our Declaration of Independence, celebrate the First Amendment. At a time like this, it’s good for us to reflect and say we need to do more and to attend to the foundations, attend to our own freedom here at home. and cultivate a culture that respects freedom, respects others, peaceful practice, and free exercise of religion, and we can live freely in a society together despite our differences of belief.
SPEAKER 08 :
Travis, where can people find that report real quickly?
SPEAKER 23 :
They can go to frc.org. It’s on our homepage now, and it’s under the page with our reports on hostility against churches.
SPEAKER 08 :
Travis Weber, FRC’s Vice President for Policy and Government Affairs, thank you so much for highlighting this new report. It’s disturbing, to say the least. I think there is definitely a role for our federal government to step in and help protect, defend the first freedom, the First Amendment that we have. Travis Weber, thank you for joining us today on Washington Watch. Thank you. All right, friends, that wraps up this edition. And we appreciate so much you entrusting this time to us as we bring you the news from a biblical worldview perspective. Have a fantastic evening. We’ll see you again tomorrow here on Washington Watch.
SPEAKER 15 :
Washington Watch with Tony Perkins is brought to you by Family Research Council and is entirely listener supported. Portions of the show discussing candidates are brought to you by Family Research Council Action. For more information on anything you heard today or to find out how you can partner with us in our ongoing efforts to promote faith, family and freedom, visit TonyPerkins.com.
