In a compelling episode, Logan and his guests critique recent anti-Christian sentiments from Senator Tim Kaine, while President Trump makes history with a bold stance in defense of religious freedoms. Learn about ACLJ’s frontline role in battling religious discrimination through court victories and international outreach, importantly addressing the threat at home and abroad. Join the conversation as the show connects global events with local realities.
SPEAKER 07 :
we got breaking news president trump blasts senator kane for his anti-christian tirade keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever this is seculo we want to hear from you share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110 And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 10 :
Monday, September 8, 2025. Welcome to Sekulow. I’m Logan Sekulow. In studio, Jordan Sekulow, my brother and Will Haynes. And we’ve got a packed show today. We’re also going to be joined by Jeff Balaban at ACLJ Jerusalem after we know there was a pretty vicious terror attack that happened overnight or this morning, I guess, in Israeli time, in time in Israel, but overnight for us in Jerusalem. We’re going to talk about that. It’s been one of the first attacks inside Jerusalem in many years now. And this, of course, comes as we are still in the midst of the war in Gaza. We’re going to talk about that. But we’re going to start first with you may need a little bit of a refresher or if you missed the show last week. That’s right. Senator Kaine, you may remember him. He ran for president, ran for vice president, was vice presidential nominee with Hillary Clinton.
SPEAKER 09 :
Is still a U.S. senator.
SPEAKER 10 :
Still a U.S. Senator. Still a known entity. And Will, set up what this was. It was a hearing.
SPEAKER 08 :
Right. So this was a hearing before the Senate committee that he is on that was having nominees. Some of the nominees were for ambassadorships. Some were for assistant secretaries of state. And this specific question was going to someone who was nominated to be assistant secretary of state for humanitarian issues. And He was questioning why the individual agreed with effectively what the Secretary of State himself, Marco Rubio, had said was policy, that the government doesn’t give us rights, that these rights are given by God, and that the government is to protect those rights. And he was very concerned with… why he would agree with that statement even though it’s in the you know declaration of independence some of our founding documents a lot of talk but this is what senator kane how he responded after asking and was asking this nominee about this notion believing that law that the rights of americans and everyone comes from god not the government bite one
SPEAKER 03 :
The notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government, but come from the Creator, that’s what the Iranian government believes. It’s a theocratic regime that bases its rule on Shia law and targets Sunnis, Baha’is, Jews, Christians, and other religious minorities. And they do it because they believe that they understand what natural rights are from their Creator. So the statement that our rights do not come from our laws or our governments is extremely troubling.
SPEAKER 08 :
And this morning, the president himself was at he weighed in museum of the Bible. There was an event there talking about many things, but one of the key things that president Trump was talking about is this task force team were there. That’s right. Yeah. Some of our attorneys were in attendance. Uh, but this task force that was created by executive order, uh, back in February. that the Department of Justice heads and Pam Bondi is the chair of, but it is to eradicate anti-Christian bias. And President Trump made a reference to the senator in his statement today because of that, why we need such a task force. Let’s go ahead and roll bite four.
SPEAKER 01 :
The need for this commission has never been more clear than it was last week when the ineffectual senator from Virginia, a man named Tim Kaine, stated that the notion, our rights come from our creator, is, quote, extremely troubling to him. Very troubling, isn’t it troubling? Isn’t that terrible, though? how he would say something like that and advocated really by a totalitarian regime. This is what they say. But as everyone in this room understands, it is tyrants who are denying our rights and the rights that come from God. And it’s this declaration of independence that proclaims we’re endowed by our creator with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s right. President Trump responding. Such a change of tone. Something you probably wouldn’t have expected to see from President of the United States even just a year ago. So I’d love to get your thoughts on this. Not just Senator Kaine, but the response from President Trump. Even the fact that he is having an event at the Museum of the Bible, I think, says a lot. Again, 1-800-684-3110 if you want to have your voice heard today. Or go to ACLJ.org right now. Leave your comments. Throw in there if you’re watching on YouTube. Where are you watching from? Be right back. Welcome back to Secular. Again, phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. Join us in the studio right now. Join our team. Washington, D.C. is expanding. I know it’s something you’ve come on to talk about the last few weeks as you’ve been spending a lot more time there, including people that can go to events like this, can be part of these conversations. Sometimes you have ACLJ attorneys who can go, but it’s good to also have government affairs because, look, there’s a lot of busy people with busy schedules, including ourselves. You can’t necessarily get to everything you’re invited to, but if we have a big enough team, a strong enough team, it can happen.
SPEAKER 09 :
And a senior enough team where they can speak on behalf of an organization our size. So you want people that have credibility both within the ACLJ, but also in the work that they do. So whether that’s some of our top legal counsels who have gotten to know people around the country, our government affairs team who’ve worked in politics and in government and our newest government affairs director. He has served four different, I think actually five different congressmen as chief of staff. along with a number of other roles that you would serve in leading up to that chief of staff positions that that’s huge but but I also want to make it clear to people we can’t get into too many details but the the DOJ task force to eradicate anti-christian bias is something that we are working with and so I think that you know it’s very important for people to know that we’re not just reporting on this task force taking action but they are that we are working with directly the Department of Justice task force to eradicate anti-Christian bias. The ACLJ is there front and center and we are just getting started working with that task force Logan and I will tell you having the expertise in our team from attorneys who are in their 70s down to attorneys who are just out of law school having that expertise all together it builds quite a team that the DOJ can then utilize.
SPEAKER 10 :
Well, I know a lot of people will look at something like anti-Christian bias, and they’re like, oh, this is like a rhetoric that the right wing is using. But you see what’s happening around the world. We’re not even just talking about America. I’m not talking about the Middle East. We’re talking about the Western world. Look what’s happening in the UK. There is so much happening that if you want to label it anti-Christian bias or anti-Christian rhetoric, I don’t know what else you would label it.
SPEAKER 09 :
this is under the Biden administration so in the under the Biden administration that DOJ sought to squelch faith in the public square by bringing federal criminal charges obtaining in numerous cases multiple year prison sentences against two dozen pro-life protesters so remember that right then you’ve got not only the pro-life protesters you’ve got the two dozen again christians who were praying and demonstrating outside of abortion clinics. That’s separate from the protesters. One of those was an 87-year-old woman. Another was a Catholic priest who was 75 years old. They were all pardoned ultimately by President Trump when he came back into office in January of 2025. We all know about the FBI targeting of Catholics. I mean and this is in when the president of the United States ordered this task force to be formed by executive order he specifically mentioned the targeting of Christians by the FBI of radical traditionalist Catholics and remember the FBI said that was just one field branch in Richmond and then we found out through people like Garrett O’Boyle and others that we represented these FBI whistleblowers that in fact that memo had gone out to thousands of FBI offices to me when I hear thousands of FBI offices that’s probably all of the FBI offices in the country I mean there can’t be many more than thousands I mean yeah it’s like someone hit reply all with that and so they lied to us about how many people it went to they they lied to us about oh we could we jumped right on and it corrected to it they did they did not remove it until ultimately we put our foot down said you must similar that training that happened inside the military When we had Operation Rescue listed as a terror group, ACLJ was able to get that removed by going to the secretary of war now. Right. And his team and saying this should not be in the training. They said, thank you so much for notifying us. It’s out.
SPEAKER 10 :
Of course, this specific instance for those just joining us, maybe you saw the title. It refers to Tim Kaine, Senator Kaine, again, former vice presidential nominee with Hillary Clinton. went on a bit of a tirade, very concerned with people who find that their inalienable rights are founded by the creator and that there are things that we should be looking to do that are inside of us and that God put in place, including life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. But he’s a problem with that. You know, kind of a dogma lives loudly in you moment from Senator Kaine. And President Trump responded this morning at an event at the Museum of the Bible. So again, kind of a back and forth that you probably should hear before we kind of move on to the next topic.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, do you want to start with what the senator said last week?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, I guess we’ll start with Senator Kaine. And again, he’s questioning, he’s pushing back, and he is deeply troubled by anyone who may hold these kind of beliefs.
SPEAKER 03 :
The notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government, but come from the creator, that’s what the Iranian government believes. It’s a theocratic regime that bases its rule on Shia law and targets Sunnis, Baha’is, Jews, Christians, and other religious minorities. And they do it because they believe that they understand what natural rights are from their creator. So the statement that our rights do not come from our laws or our governments is extremely troubling.
SPEAKER 10 :
And so we end up boring you with the same clip again. President Trump actually went on and elaborated in his first clip. He talked specifically about Senator Kaine and how he had issues with what he had to say. And then he moved on and discussed the anti-Christian bias of what’s happening and about anti-Semitism and things like that.
SPEAKER 08 :
Will, which bite? Yeah, let’s go ahead and play bite five, because this is directly responding after basically saying that, you know, it’s actually tyrants that disagree with what the Declaration of Independence says, not tyrants that try to uphold that. He should be ashamed. He said this is where he calls him out again. Bite five.
SPEAKER 01 :
The senator from Virginia should be ashamed of himself for many things. for many things, for things even beyond that. But in its own way, nothing’s more important than those words. Oh, terrible words. As president, I will always defend our nation’s glorious heritage, and we will protect the Judeo-Christian principles of our founding, and we will protect them with vigor. We have to bring back religion in America, bring it back stronger than ever before as our country grows stronger and stronger.
SPEAKER 08 :
And Jordan, when you hear that from the president, one, that is it may sound nice at a meeting, a gathering of clearly religious leaders. Ralph Reed is there. Dr. Phil is there. There’s a lot of individuals from all over the religious spectrum.
SPEAKER 10 :
Religious leaders like Ralph Reed and Dr. Phil.
SPEAKER 08 :
That kind of covers the gamut, right?
SPEAKER 09 :
I guess. It’s a broad gamut of people who speak to faith issues, speak to issues of morality in our country.
SPEAKER 08 :
that from the president it’s not just the words that he’s speaking but it is backed up by the action this uh this first instance the executive order was signed february 6 2025 we know that one it takes time you have to build those it has individuals on this task force from across the government the chair is pam bondy in the department of justice but In addition to the chair, the task force shall consist of other following members, Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury, Secretary, this was still of defense at the time, Secretary of Labor, and it goes on and on. And we know that we are now working. We’ve already provided an initial report to the DOJ. We look to help in any way possible. Because, Jordan, it takes time. It does. Especially when you’re coming off of a Department of Justice like we had under President Biden, where they were doing the opposite of this. They were protecting the religious liberty and freedom of Americans. They were going after that aggressively. One, you have a lot of holdovers. You have other people that that wasn’t their purview per se, but they just weren’t looking into these types of bias in the federal government. Not only do you have to have the individuals within the government change, but that’s why groups like ours can be a powerful tool for the Department of Justice because this is something we live and breathe every day trying to put it into this type of bias and attack against Christians.
SPEAKER 09 :
Absolutely and we are really excited about the opportunity to work with some colleagues at the Department of Justice on this task force as it continues to broaden out as Will said it’s not just a task force to eradicate what’s gone on inside you know DOJ and FBI though we have examples from that it’s looking at all the different branches of the federal government to eradicate anti-Christian bias from within they have the most power from within when you’re leading those offices and I thought You know what is great about this task force is it’s not just one department at the Department of Justice, it’s a conglomeration of specialists from different departments who have different strengths that we’re able then to work with and so we’re very excited again about the task force and now that it’s at the stage to where we can start taking action alongside them and that is your ACLJ at work right there.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s right. You should support the work of the ACLJ. When you hear that, you hear our teams are everywhere. Go to ACLJ.org. You can make a donation at any time.
SPEAKER 09 :
We have did communications sometimes. I mean, we’ve had attorneys in four to five different places. And I actually think that that is really impressive to DOJ to show that the ACLJ, it’s not just one office in Washington, D.C. These are attorneys spread out across the country. We’ve got active litigation ongoing. Some are joining from their phones. Some are joining from hotel rooms because they are out in the field arguing frauds. for the client’s religious liberty. We’re doing this work.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, we’re going to talk about that even in the next segment. We’re talking more about what’s going on even in Chicago with the street preachers. There’s some updates there. And a little bit later on, we’re joined by Jeff Balaban from ACLJ Jerusalem, head of ACLJ Jerusalem. As we know, there was a terror attack. It may not have showed up on your news. A terror attack. Multiple people are dead in Jerusalem, not usually where these attacks happen. But unfortunately, it’s where we are, again, in an interesting state in this war between Israel and Hamas and the whole Gaza situation. Where do we go from here? I think there’s frustration on both sides now, and I think we need to figure out how to rapidly end the bloodshed that’s going on. Go right now if you can. Go to ACLJ.org. I want you to support the work we’re doing right now. You can donate or become an ACLJ champion. That is by becoming a recurring monthly donor. You can do that. There’s an easy button. Just be a champion. Click that button. You’ll be up to $5 and up, whatever it is. Welcome back to Secular. We did want to give you an update on some of the work of the ACLJ. In the meantime, though, I’m going to ask you to call in. We have a second half hour after this segment, which we’re going to take as many calls as we can. We’ve got some phone lines open for you at 1-800-684-3110. Of course, we’re timing the anti-Christian bias coming in right now and the anti-Christian rhetoric coming in from whether it was Senator Kaine or really from around the world. as this is happening. And of course, we’ve talked about obviously what’s going on in Israel as well. We’re going to be joined by our head of ACLJ Jerusalem in the next segment, Jeff Balabanch. You make sure you stay tuned for that. But Will, I know we want to talk about some of the work here at the ACLJ because there may be talk that there is this anti-Christian bias, but we know it. We see it in the streets. We’re seeing it happening in real time. And we have actually a lot of cases right now, including street preachers in Chicago. They’re going to be on trial this week. We’re going to send our crew up there. We’re going to make sure that’s covered. Obviously, we have our legal team there as well. There are some victories from some GE employees. And of course, some homeowners. People love the homeowners associations.
SPEAKER 08 :
I do love it.
SPEAKER 10 :
I love the old HOAs. Which again, former member of an HOA. So I think I have to state that. Is that like journalistic integrity? Like I am a former vice president. Right. Kind of like Tim Kaine, almost. Never made it. Yeah, I was like a yes man. Right. But it’s okay. Let’s talk about, though, this work in the ACLJ. I know there is some more commentary also from President Trump about this.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s kind of how I wanted to start this off. This is President Trump once again at this event this morning talking about this anti-Christian bias because I think it’s important for people to remember while it needs to be eradicated, one, within the federal government, But when the federal government is tipping the scales against one individual or one group, namely in this case, what the last four years we saw was this bias against Christians and people of faith and the way that they use the Department of Justice against them, whether it be prosecuting, as Jordan brought up, you know, grandmothers that were protesting abortion all the way to sending spies into Catholic churches. But this is kind of what set the tone for the entire country. And let’s talk about how President Trump is pushing back on it by nine.
SPEAKER 01 :
I created the first ever Department of Justice Task Force to eradicate anti-Christian bias. And for those people that are a little bit naive or not well-read, there is a tremendous anti-Christian bias. We don’t hear about it. We don’t think about it. You hear about anti-Semitic, but you don’t hear about anti-Christian. Now, you have a strong anti-Christian bias, but we’re ending that rapidly, I will tell you. We’re in a much different world today than we were one year ago. This is like a different world.
SPEAKER 08 :
And we have President Trump making these statements and talking about how this is a new place. The world feels much different. It has to start at the federal government. But Jordan, this week on Thursday, we have a trial in Chicago. If people saw the break video, we already won a victory for one day. individual that was a street preacher but then the very next day two of his friends were arrested for the same thing he was arrested for but we got off with them they are taking them all the way to trial and so they decided to take it to federal court and that’s where we are fighting back.
SPEAKER 09 :
So in the initial case involving it was in Chicago in the state court system That was not successful. Big victory there for ACLJ and our supporters. So for these two others, exact same fact patterns, as close as you can get to the same fact pattern, same location, area, conduct. This prosecutor who’s lost at the state level, now let’s see, maybe we can find one of those federal judges who’s a lot more hostile to these Christian actors and the message that they have. Let’s treat them different than the people on the streets of Chicago. handing out paper they probably don’t have permits for to come see this concert or come to this restaurant or half-price tickets for Wrigley Field. And they don’t mess with that group. They arrest the Christian street preachers and try to take them to federal court this time. They lost in state court, so now they take them to federal court.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, I mean, it’s not something that, again, it’s uncommon that you wouldn’t think you’d see. Not these days. And you see street preachers, like you said, barkers that are out there trying to get you to… There’s wild stuff going on in city streets right now.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah. I would imagine that these individuals were the least wild.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s what I mean. That’s like what you fully expect to see. You go to Atlanta, you go hang around like the aquarium. I mean, you get approached by every group, whether that is the ACLU or whether that is the Hare Krishnas are still out there.
SPEAKER 09 :
All the tourists coming through, the groups coming through, that’s like part of your stop. So they know this is where there’s a ripe group of people to speak to. And guess what?
SPEAKER 10 :
I had a guy put in New York, put a bracelet on me and said he was going to get blessed. And I said, I have no money.
SPEAKER 09 :
And he slapped me on the wrist. They’re not supposed to do that. Yeah. Let’s tell people that. Don’t touch people. Don’t touch. But. What you’re talking about there, Logan, is because as long as they’re on a public sidewalk and other than the case of the bracelet guy, if they’re just talking about their religious message or their political message or their view on an issue like the ACLU or Greenpeace, that’s just looking usually for petition signatures and signing up to get more information. We totally defend that. if on both sides of the aisle of course it just happens to be the Christians that they love to go against you know why they think we just we turn the other cheek we don’t fight back we say oh we’re sorry so let’s just let the crazies out there and the liberals out there but the Christians let’s act like we have you know kind of no representation in our country or in these cities like a Chicago or New York or LA where the Christian population I’m talking about conservative Christian population is still huge oh yeah if you’re talking about this amount of people yeah
SPEAKER 10 :
It’s going to be big in this country.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, and once again, as we’re fighting that, we also know the crime issues in Chicago and just the disparity between taking this to trial when they have a lot bigger issues going on. But we also have two victories. And to some people, they may seem small because it’s not a national issue. I mean, as the ACLJ works with the DOJ task force on eliminating this anti-Christian bias, we still have to fight. And we do fight at no cost to the individual client to protect their individual rights. We have two victories that we just want to briefly mention that one was for a GE employee who was fired after asking to take Sundays off just to practice his faith. We know federal law protects that. And we had a victory there and were able to get a settlement for this individual. And then another where an HOA. This is not the Virginia one we won last week. This is for members of this HOA in Colorado who were not able to. to have a Bible study in the HOA’s clubhouse. We have a victory there. We are going to monitor it. She’s about to have two days from now, her first Bible study since this victory in the clubhouse. We will make sure that the HOA lives up to their end of the bargain. But really, Jordan, it’s As it trickles down from what the federal government put on full display of what they said was okay to do, basically open season on violating the First Amendment right of Americans, that’s why we have to go to these HOAs. That’s why we have to fight these private companies that feel like they can get away with violating people’s First Amendment right and their freedom of religion in this country.
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s absolutely right you know whether it is the government and you know when the federal government and we’ve got friends in there who are you know starting these task force what we can look at is eradicating this from the federal government remember the federal government is not just Washington D.C. the federal buildings all over the country you know your postal service think about all of your social security offices I mean passport offices when you go to airports federal government’s everywhere IRS is everywhere DOJ’s office is everywhere the courts federal court systems are everywhere so it’s not like it’s just in Washington DC but then we also you know we fight this out at the state level and and because this is a constitutionally guaranteed right it doesn’t matter if you’re fighting this in the federal government or the state government it’s the same type of standing you cannot violate the religious liberty rights of the American people whether they are at a private employer or a public employer like the federal government There are certain limits. There are rules that are in place. And we want to make sure, along with DOJ, that the bad actors are eradicated.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s right. Hey, we’ve got a second half an hour coming up. We want you to join us in this second half hour, whether it’s on ACLJ.org, on YouTube, on Rumble, on Facebook, however you watch us live. It’s 12 to 1 p.m. Eastern time. Of course, you can find us later on archived on your favorite podcast players, on YouTube, wherever it may be, or on ACLJ.org, the ACLJ app. But if you’re with us, stay tuned. We have a second half hour coming up. If you lose us on your local station, find us broadcasting live online right now. We’ll be right back.
SPEAKER 07 :
Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 10 :
Welcome back. Second half hour of Sekulow. We’re going to be joined by Jeff Balaban, ACLJ Jerusalem, coming up in the next segment. I want to hear from you at 1-800-684-3110. We’re mainly talking about the anti-Christian bias and President Trump’s mission to eradicate that, whether that’s in this country, which obviously we’re starting to see more and more of on a scale. We’ve been talking about that in the ACLJ for years. We’ve got cases right now, whether that’s our street preachers in Chicago or whether that’s going on with the homeowners associations. You want to talk about that? Give me a brief homeowners association. Give me a little chat about it.
SPEAKER 08 :
Oh, well, I mean, you know, I’m seeing some opinions about them in the chat. I don’t mean them in general. I mean what they were doing. Well, I wanted to talk about this. This is actually a lot more fascinating. Okay, go ahead. No, but these HOAs, and we’ve seen this across the country. I didn’t approve that new sign. There was one that we won a victory in last week in Virginia. That one we actually had to take to federal court because the homeowners association refused. Even after us laying out the law, like, here’s what it says. Here’s what you cannot do. They still refuse to allow members of the community dues paying HOA members to use their facilities if it was for a religious purpose. We won that. And then this one, this is for HOA members in Colorado. that were not able to have a Bible study in their clubhouse. They were not able to use that facility as any other member of the community would because it was for a Bible study. We have a victory there. Our client will be able to meet with her Bible study two days from now. And we are going to ensure by monitoring, making sure that the HOA lives up to what they have said and will allow that to move forward. And for people watching, once again, If this is something that happens to you, reach out to the ACLJ, ACLJ.org slash help. No thing is too small because we will go for the individuals in Colorado or in Virginia with their individual HOA when their rights are being violated, when they are being discriminated against for their religion and not able to take part in their community.
SPEAKER 09 :
something that a benefit that every member of their community has except for them because they are christian or religious because they want to use it for a bible study a gathering that we will be there yeah we’ve seen it hoas so where you’ve got those country club kind of rooms set the club room set up or you can have community gatherings a lot of times it’s so you could if you need more space in your house and you want to have like a party uh you rate those out sometimes it’d be like the birthday parties whatever it’s whatever it’s a way actually for the HOA to uh to take in some some services they can keep you know the the yards and everything they take care of uh keep it nice yeah if you have a community pool a lot of times yeah oh there’s a little you know you want to do a birthday party and things like that i mean i’ve been taking too long explaining this but sometimes there’s a hut But I’m just saying, you would assume if you live in that neighborhood, when it says it’s open to all for events and then they have their rules, except they didn’t put their, oh, by the way, you do everything but religious. No, they started coming up with that. They said, you know what? We’re not going to let you be in here for political or religious reasons. And most of the attendees, if not all, I think 95%, live in the neighborhood already. They just said, instead of trying to cram all into one house, let’s use the HOA. We pay for it. Let’s use the clubhouse. And, you know, I look at that and I say, you know, this can happen anywhere in the country. And most people, because it’s their neighborhood and the HOA has their neighbors on it, say, you know what? Never mind. I’ll just keep paying my HOA fees, even though they’ve banned me from using the service. Yeah. Our clients said, no, we saw it in a different way. Government wise in California, where there was that event space and they would allow everyone to operate. And then they said, no, uh, Christian groups can’t show your movie here. So we won in both those instances.
SPEAKER 10 :
All right, hey, phone lines are open for you, I believe, at 1-800-684-3110. If you were on hold earlier or for some reason it dropped, give us a call back. We do have some lines open at 1-800-684-3110. That’s 1-800-684-3110. In the next segment, Jeff Balamon is going to be joining us. He’s the head of ACLJ Jerusalem. You may not have heard because it hasn’t made a lot of news. That’s sort of the sphere that we live in, which was multiple people were killed overnight. And this was this morning in Jerusalem. And again, this is from terrorists that Elisa Moss has been praising. And this happened on a bus. in jerusalem again and if you’re not that familiar with it this is not very common in these areas this to be happening i think this starts to give us another wake-up call that not only is this war still happening but what needs to be done i’m going to talk to jeff about that with an honest open conversation i think we have to have now of what this next chapter of the war in gaza is going to look like we’ll be right back with jeff balaban phone lines are open Welcome back to Seculo. Jeff Balaban from ACLJ Jerusalem in Jerusalem right now is with us live. Jeff, it’s such a strange occurrence because my wife and I were having a discussion last night, like as we’re laying in bed, got to go to sleep. But my son’s bar mitzvah is coming up. We’ve been talking about it. And there’s one big missing piece that we’ve not been able to do with him. And that is obviously to take him to Israel to experience what it’s like. And I go, you know what? One of our friends is hosting a trip there next month. And I thought, maybe it’s time. Maybe things have calmed down. Maybe we need to discuss this. And of course, we were having the open and honest discussion about safety and all the things that could happen. And I was like, but it rarely happens in Jerusalem. You don’t see this happen in a lot of this. And we wake up this morning. And once again, now, of course, a lot of the reports are it’s been a number of years since something like this has happened. A number of years is, what, a year and a half, two years. And of course, there have been other instances between now and then in Tel Aviv. And there have been plenty of things but you wake up to the news and again it’s not getting a ton of mainstream coverage here in america uh that two gunmen palestinian gunmen opened fire at a bus stop and on this bus uh killing six injuring uh quite a few um and again at a moment where hamas praises it everyone praises it and you see this is a strictly um you know specifically this is a terrorist attack uh that happens and it’s happening now in the streets of jerusalem Which again, I have friends that are there right now, of course you and other people who have great events happening and meetings happening and you want to see Jerusalem, you want to see Israel thrive and reopen. But this is not the news that they need to wake up to when we’re finally trying to get things back on track.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, it’s really no end to the levels on which this is a tragedy and which is suffering for the whole country here. There’s a sense of identity that the whole country feels. It was a very busy area in Jerusalem, a very busy bus stop in Jerusalem, people on the way to school and work. And I’ll say what comes out of it, there’s some extraordinary videos being played now on social media, on Israeli television. For example, a cab driver, middle-aged guy, who there’s obviously shots, people are fleeing. He gets up, he walks around and he opens the door escorts an elderly lady out, his passenger, while he’s doing it, like a bullet shatters the bus window right next to him, but he is trying to get her to safety. There are other videos of a young guy, obviously a yeshiva student, a Talmudic student, scholar, who is also in the army rushing in, and he is actually one of the ones who engaged the terrorists with fire and helped neutralize, as they say here, kill those terrorists. And so, you know, and then the names go out. The names go out first for prayers and then also for just condolences. So it’s a public event and it’s yet always a very personal and private event here. And what you did in tying into the bigger picture, everybody here, the news especially, is tying this into the bigger picture. to the bigger picture of Israel’s got to be tougher, tougher, and tougher. And all the pressure in the world that’s pushing Israel in the opposite direction is just making it easier for these terrorists to do it. And the last thing I’ll say about this is everyone across the board is saying it’s very clear. This is not a couple of random guys showed up with an idea this morning. Let’s kill a bunch of Jews. This is a well-planned, well-stocked, really well done terror attack that was unfortunately successful as opposed to the literally over a thousand a year that the forces here are able to stop before they get to this point.
SPEAKER 10 :
Well, Jeff, that brings up a much bigger question that I kind of wonder what’s happening in Israel because we’ve seen some of the protests even happening on the streets of Israel. We saw the protests happening in Germany and all these other places throughout the country. throughout the world that, of course, are… Look, Israel is losing the PR war. We’ve said that. That’s been something that’s been very difficult to overcome. When moments like this happen, though, you kind of jump to two things. And I was at a text thread. Look, there’s probably things where you get frustrated and you start talking just because you’re out of grief, out of sadness, out of anger, because you look at the world stage and go, well, what can be done here? And I feel like we’re at a breaking point for a lot of people. We’re either Netanyahu and their regime have just got to go finish this, however that looks like. You got to finish the war and take care of war. If their goal is to wipe out Hamas the way they said it, Maybe get that done. And then the opposite, if not, then maybe it’s time to start looking at other options because it’s starting to get to that point of like when it starts boiling over into the streets of Jerusalem and it starts boiling over into the streets of all these other places. Why is that not where we’re at here? Is it because of this sort of pushback, this PR pushback that’s happening from you’d say the whole world at this point?
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, I mean, Israel was, unfortunately, didn’t really understand. They thought that they were going to actually, people were going to be sympathetic after the horrors that occurred on October 7th. But that sympathy lasted all of a couple of weeks. And then it flipped to this narrative of, really, the problem is that Israel never should have been here in the first place. The problem is that they don’t mean that Israel shouldn’t be… you know, where is Israel? It’s not in Gaza. Israel left Gaza, you know, 20 years ago. All that altogether. So where should Israel not be? And that’s what, going back to what people heard and didn’t understand, that’s what river to the sea means. The objection here is to Israel’s existence at all. It is a question, a quest for annihilation. And Israel really has been responding to that quest by trying to negotiate. But you cannot negotiate with those who have only one goal, which is your utter annihilation. There is no middle ground here. Only one of these is going to survive. Israel, or some new Palestinian creation. It’s obvious to me that it’s in the world’s interests, it’s in the Middle East interests, it’s America’s interests, and it’s certainly in the Jews’ interests that Israel be the one that survived. The entire Palestinian concept, which was created after the State of Israel came into existence, this lie that Israel was occupying all their territory, these lies that, you know, there were never temples in Jerusalem, Jesus was a Palestinian, these are just lies. This is the indigenous Jewish homeland. There are 20 plus Arab states. There are 50 plus Muslim states. This is the one tiny little Jewish state and they will not let it live. Israel has to be stronger and stop negotiating and just take the territory and say, we’re here and we’re not leaving. We’re pushing the rest out.
SPEAKER 10 :
And maybe they can just get this done. I saw one of the influencers I follow, journalists in this space, sort of free speech journalists. She said, you know, what people don’t understand is, you know, there’s actually more Jewish people right now. There’s more Jewish people on October 7th than there were for years because there was pretty much no Jewish people left in that area. Everyone had left, but because they were hostages taken into Gaza, all of a sudden you had Jewish people back in that area. That had not happened in a number of years, as you said, not occupying. That’s not what that area was. But I thought that was just an interesting tidbit of how did you get Jewish people back in there? By taking them hostage.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right. And Jeff, I also wanted to bring up that last year, the Israeli security forces say that they thwarted over a thousand organized terrorist attacks. What would be something like this? So for people also to remember that within Jerusalem, this is a constant threat. I mean, that’s, you know, three a day average that they had thwarted over an entire year. That means that That one, the security forces are doing an excellent job of stopping that, but it is a constant threat of something like this that could happen, that could slip through. But I also want to bring up that this specific type of event, when they say globalize the intifada. This is the classic Intifada tactic. This is the suicide bombing, the running onto a bus and shooting people. So when you hear people say, globalize the Intifada, they mean this specific type of terror. They don’t mean rockets launching like Hamas does. They literally mean Palestinian terror by taking and targeting indiscriminately civilians on a city bus and making sure that they kill Jews. That is all they care about. And I just wanted to get your response to that.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I think it means what you say, well, it means kill Jews, but it means kill their enemies, which includes people who are not Jews. I mean, they’re not shy about killing others in Europe or in America, and they say death to America. Israel’s always been the front line of this, and people feel more comfortable, honestly, saying, well, this is Israel’s problem. It’s not. It is all of our problem. And that people being, you know, turned extremists by this and buying into this narrative, not just in places in the Middle East, but on our campuses in America. And that this is being, and there’s also evidence being paid for and recruited by foreign terrorist organizations. People need to recognize this is something very serious that America has to deal with and America does deal with. A friend of mine who, after 9-11, joined the New York police on intelligence, told me that for the years he was doing it, he just couldn’t sleep at night. The number of potential attacks going on in America also. So my job isn’t here to scare people. So recognize, number one, you know, there are a lot of bad people in the world doing a lot of bad things. Maybe it’s more intense right here, right now. Logan, I wouldn’t tell you not to have a bar mitzvah in Israel. Really, I wouldn’t tell you not to do it. We could talk about that privately afterwards. And I’m still here, and people still live here. People are not running away, but recognize there’s a real enemy to our civilization. And, you know, it’s every segment we talk about on the show, these are the enemies of our civilization, whether they’re doing it sitting in a Senate saying that rights don’t come from God, they come from the government, or they’re people who want to blow up your buses. This is a question of really, of good versus evil. There’s a Judeo-Christian idea that’s being fought against right now, and we’re living in that generation.
SPEAKER 10 :
Well, Jeff, we appreciate you being there. And of course, you know, we’re talking about this. It’s more, it just feels like every time it feels like there’s a calm, something like this bubbles up and becomes part of the news cycle.
SPEAKER 09 :
I would say too, and Jeff, I appreciate you joining us and everything you’re doing for us in Israel. But, you know, this used to be the type of terrorist attack we’re kind of used to. Yeah. happening every few months, maybe a couple times a year, and then Israel would come down. But when you add it to what the ongoing conflict coming from all these different directions, I think that’s what makes people a little bit more nervous. And I know how important it is for Israel to get back to business at 100%, be that economic business or tourism as well, or to have that bar mitzvah or bat mitzvah over there.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, absolutely. Listen, Jeff, thank you for joining us. It’s the reason we have an ACLJ Jerusalem. We can’t do that without you. So I encourage you, obviously, to support the work of the ACLJ. When you do that, it helps our international offices as well. That’s ACLJ Jerusalem. That’s the ECLJ. That is all our other entities, some of which we can’t talk about, some of which we can’t. But we do have some phone lines open for you at 1-800-684-3110. I always like to hear from you to wrap up this show. So if you’re on hold, stay on hold. If you’re not on hold, get on hold. This is the time to do it. Give us a call. at 1-800-684-3110. That’s 1-800-684-3110. We’ll be right back with more on Sekulow. Welcome back to Secular. We do have a few lines open, so if you want to call in, great time to do it. Helps us out, actually. We want to hear from you. There’s thousands of you watching online. I’m looking at right now the comments. There’s thousands of you watching even on YouTube alone, so why don’t you be part of the conversation by calling us at 1-800-684-3110. Let’s go ahead and take our first call. Let’s go to Ronald, who’s calling from Georgia. Ronald’s listening on the radio. Ronald, go ahead.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, I’d like to point out the flaw in Tim Kaine’s argument concerning what we believe our God has given us, inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But those rights are backed by Ten Commandments. Honor your mother and father. Do not murder. Do not commit adultery. Do not steal, bear false witness, or covet. Those are common sense laws. He was comparing us with Sharia law. And I don’t even know about Sharia law other than Mohammed was one man. And that probably all the laws came down from this one guy. And who knows what he was all about. So that was my comment that Tim came a little bit off with that comparison of Sharia. Our rights and given by, you know, our God and their rights are Sharia law rights. We don’t know where they came from.
SPEAKER 10 :
Well, it’s a very different set of laws if you want to be. I mean, yes, I mean, there are some religious connections between Judaism, Islam, Christianity. There are some similar stories that are built in.
SPEAKER 09 :
But the legal law and the laws of man, what you’re looking at is just your basic freedoms of being a human being. and what those protections should be. And yes, over time, we have, I think, made those protections broader and safer because those were much more dangerous and violent times that we used to live in. But it’s the idea that it starts at this point. As created by God, with a unique ability in mind to make our own decisions, to rationalize, what differentiates us from animals, is that there are certain unwritten but just natural laws that come from that. Really, most of it is how to treat your neighbors, how to treat other human beings with, again, murder being wrong, kindness being right, charity being good, robbing being bad. These kind of ideas that the ability to speak your mind should be legal and you shouldn’t have to fear any retribution. That’s what we’re talking about here. And then you build off those rights. It’s the exact opposite of authoritarian religious law. That is not what the Founding Fathers were talking about. They were talking about the basics that God instilled in human beings. But you have to start with that. You have to start there, that human beings are different than apes or gorillas.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, and as well, when you start to really dig in, him completely forgetting what the Declaration of Independence states, but even the following line after where our rights come from, it sets up what our system of government should be, where it says we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We always say that. But then the very next line complements that and shows where the flaws in the senator’s thinking began that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That they don’t inherently have power. Those just powers are derived from the consent of those that put them in place. And that those governments aren’t instituted among men to create the rights. They are to secure the rights, to protect the rights. And even if you look back at our history as a nation, Is Tim Kaine really okay with saying that every right our government put in place from time to time was okay? That the government creating rights. I don’t think so. I think many of the quote unquote rights. Virginia. Exactly. And I think many of those quote unquote rights that the government may have put in place were actually in the face, flew in the face of what our Constitution said in our Declaration of Independence saying that all men are created equal. So just on the face of it. He should be a little bit better student of history.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, that man, aka kings and queens, should not be able to override those natural rights. Whether you are an Ayatollah, a king, a queen, a member of the monarchy, that you do not have the power to take away those basic fundamental rights we have as human beings. That we will always strive, like you said, it’s never perfect. but it gives us something to always strive for as a nation that cares about how people are treated here and abroad. So we always want to work towards those constitutional requirements to make sure everyone is receiving them equally. It’s not to say we’re perfect. It’s to say this is what we want to work towards. We want to work towards perfection. We know we can’t get there. We’re human beings, and we have to right wrongs along the way.
SPEAKER 10 :
Sure. And let’s remember, we are in a very different time now. People give a lot of grief to President Trump. Of course, some of his rhetoric, some of his language, a lot of it I don’t love as well. But I’d say there’s not been a president that has gone out this far in recent history. I mean, I really don’t even know about in history. as far as to take these issues of anti-Christian bigotry and some of the talks that have been coming through as clearly as President Trump. Again, you can argue the merits of whether you think he believes it or not, but the man is willing to say it. And that has been unlike any other president, like I said, in my lifetime. The closest you can maybe get to was George W. Bush, and he would usually get like 80% there, 90% there, always back it off a little bit. And look, I liked him especially at the time, but you definitely didn’t have this strong of words coming out of a president of the United States. You had political words.
SPEAKER 08 :
So let’s hear from President Trump, which bite you want to play. Let’s play bite four. This is the beginning of his response to what Tim Kaine had to say, as well as why we need this commission to eradicate anti-Christian bias within the federal government. Bite four.
SPEAKER 01 :
The need for this commission has never been more clear than it was last week when the ineffectual senator from Virginia, a man named Tim Kaine, stated that the notion our rights come from our creator is, quote, extremely troubling to him. Very troubling. Isn’t it troubling? Isn’t that terrible, though? How he would say something like that and advocated really by a totalitarian regime. This is what they say. But as everyone in this room understands, it is tyrants who are denying our rights and the rights that come from God. And it’s this declaration of independence that proclaims we’re endowed by our creator with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
SPEAKER 10 :
All right. That is from President Trump. We only have a minute and a half left in this show today. I want to thank you guys for joining us. People are getting back to work. School is happening. When that happens, times kind of get changed for the ACLJ. We got to make sure we start moving into the next portion of our year, really the back portion of our year, the most important time. Because, Jordan, we are not only expanding what’s going on in Washington, D.C., we are in cases around the country right now. This is when Supreme Court session starts back up in a few weeks. All of this starts to really start boiling over in October.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yes, that’s right. So people are back to school, which means the back to school constitutional violations start coming in. Christmas is coming. We were already talking about that. We’ve been talking about that on one of our legal calls today. Christmas tree, but can you have a menorah? This and that. I mean, it’s all happening now. And that’s why you want to support the work of the ACLJ today, if you can, at ACLJ.org. Again, it’s a quick donation. It’s so we’re able to continue to do all the work that we do, but also expand on that work. And I want to encourage you, if you feel like something you heard today or even last week on the show happened to you or maybe someone you know, You contact us at aclj.org slash help or have your friend contact us at aclj.org slash help. Never be afraid to contact us. Our attorneys want to hear from you and they will review it and they will get back to you at aclj.org slash help. We know this is when the battles begin. It’s this time of year. We’ll talk to you tomorrow.
