Explore the intricate dynamics of freedom and legal advocacy with our conversation on blasphemy laws in Pakistan. We provide updates on high-profile cases and the ongoing efforts of the ACLJ to advocate for human rights worldwide. This episode places a spotlight on the challenges and triumphs in promoting religious freedom, underscoring the global necessity for advocacy and informed dialogue.
SPEAKER 08 :
On today’s show, FBI Director Kash Patel faces the Senate Judiciary Committee.
SPEAKER 04 :
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 Sekula.
SPEAKER 08 :
Welcome to Sekula. We are going to be taking your calls. Will Haynes is in studio with me right now. Phone lines are open for you. 1-800-684-3110. That’s 1-800-684-3110. We are talking about right now, Kesha Patel. Is he still in the air? You’re just wrapped up? Still here? Senate Judiciary Committee meeting that he does.
SPEAKER 03 :
This was fairly regular. They host these. It’s part of the oversight function of the Senate Judiciary Committee is they host the administration heads of different departments under their purview.
SPEAKER 08 :
What’s good is you get kind of an inside look of what’s actually going on, what’s happening in Washington, D.C. And look, we’ve had a week full of chaos, a week full of heartbreak and shock. So sometimes it’s good to take a little bit of a breather and be able to know what else is going on as, again, Kash Patel faces this committee. And what we’ve learned through him is he’s not afraid to give actually a decent amount of information at these hearings. And that is what we have found today. I just want to kick off with a soundbite from this.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, this is something we’re paying attention to. Will, you want to set this up? Yes. So this is actually from the opening statement of Director Patel. And we’ll get into a lot of the other stuff that was asked by the senators as well, including some new information on the Charlie Kirk assassination. But I think we should lead with this, where this is him going over the work the FBI has done under his leadership as compared to last year’s numbers from the FBI. Let’s play Byte 19.
SPEAKER 01 :
Under this administration, the FBI has arrested more than 23,000 violent criminals. That’s more than twice for the same time period from last year alone. 23,000, more than twice from the same time period last year. We’ve taken over 6,000 illegal firearms off the streets. That number is an exponential increase. We’ve identified and located more than 4,700 child victims. More than 4,700 child victims have been found by this FBI. That is a 35% increase from the same time period last year. 1,500 child predators have been arrested. That’s a 5% increase from the same time last year. 300 human traffickers have been arrested. That’s a 10% increase from the same time last year. Over 350 members of Trende Aragua, a foreign terrorist organization, have been arrested, and we have 42 ongoing cases. That is a 250% increase from the same time last year. Those are just some of the things the FBI is doing differently and better because we are leading the mission to crush violent crime and defend the homeland. We have also arrested… Four, captured four top 10 fugitives from the FBI’s top 10 most wanted list. To put that in perspective, that’s the same amount I’ve captured in seven months than my predecessor did during the entirety of the Biden administration. Those are real results, and the credit is to the men and women at the FBI.
SPEAKER 08 :
Again, that’s Kash Patel just this morning. It’s happening right now as we speak. If you’re watching live, that’s meeting with the U.S. Senate Judiciary. That’s happening. He has to answer all these questions. And what’s good about this is, look, we can go through a week of chaos and issues, but let’s look at a bigger picture here. And that bigger picture is a lot of what the FBI is doing has resulted in very positive results. I mean, just alone, you just want to take the 4,700 child victims. since they took over. 4,700, nearly 5,000 child victims have been located, identified and located and found by the FBI. It’s a 35% increase from the previous year. He goes through a lot of other stats, but that’s the big one that jumps out to me. When you look at this, obviously there’s a lot of different ones, but that one is one we should be celebrating.
SPEAKER 03 :
I think we can talk to that a little bit as well. And there’s a lot more coming from this hearing that we’ll get into in the next segment. including the way that they’re handling attacks on churches, on Christians, as well as some update on that investigation into the assassination of Charlie Kirk. But I mean, showing real results and actually getting back to the mission of what the FBI is supposed to be doing, as opposed to the politicization that we saw in the previous administration.
SPEAKER 08 :
I see a lot of comments coming in saying, hey, they didn’t do anything with the Charlie Kirk situation and the The dad had to turn them in. Obviously, it was a fairly short amount of time. But if you have frustrations even with this FBI, that’s okay. You can call in. I want to hear from you at 1-800-684-3110. We’re also going to be joined by CeCe Heil a little bit later to give you a big update on what’s going on with the ACLJ’s work in Pakistan supporting Christians there in a new case. You’re not going to want to miss this. Stay tuned. Welcome back to Secular. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. We are talking about that committee hearing right now that Kash Patel is releasing a lot of information. Again, not just about current events, what’s happening in the news, but also even some of the crime statistics that are coming in, including the rescuing of thousands of children off the streets, much more so than his predecessor. Went through a lot of those specific details, but there are some updates online. on some of those breaking news items. I do want you to give us a call. I want to hear from you. I see a lot of comments coming in, a lot of brand new people in the chat. That’s great. Welcome. If you’re watching on YouTube, if you want to call in though, have your voice heard, you can at 1-800-684-3110. Phone lines are wide open right now. So this would be a great time to do it. Also. Just a little bit of a pop culture news, the passing of Robert Redford that happened this morning. Will, you got a favorite Robert Redford movie?
SPEAKER 03 :
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid has obviously got to be top. He was also in the original movie, Jay Gatsby, in The Great Gatsby. We watched that in high school. Very good film, very good book. That’s Scott Fitzgerald. The Sting. Oh, I love The Sting. Good movie. Good music. Yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right, phone lines are open for you. Marvin Hamlisch, 1-800-684-3110, 1-800-684-3110. Let’s break down a little bit, though, what’s going on with this hearing. Now, this isn’t something that has happened, Will, because of the Charlie Kirk assassination. Right. But because these can happen on a regular basis, though this has been the first one, really, he’s done, to this specific group. Right. We have seen Tulsi Gabbard. We’ve seen other people have these kind of hearings, and it is a bit more transparent than it feels like it was for the last decade, the last four years.
SPEAKER 03 :
How many times did you hear Director Wray say, I don’t know, I don’t know? Many times when Director Patel was saying, I don’t know, they were asking for a very specific, precise number at a very individualized field office. How many people have either resigned at this specific facility field office and he’s like I don’t know that but I will get you the response with director Ray it was always something broad like why was the FBI targeting Catholic churches and he’s like I don’t know I feel like it was just one field office so you’re already seeing a difference in the tone the transparency I did like the laying out of the statistics of what the FBI has already done I mean 23,000 violent criminals that they have arrested since he has been the director, you know, 6,000 illegal firearms. These are things that have been taken off the streets. These are things that every American should be celebrating because now one of the main criticisms we had about the FBI under James Comey and then director Ray was that the FBI had become a political machine. It had almost gone back to that J. Edgar Hoover era where the director was able to utilize and wield the FBI as a political force, and that’s what they were doing. They were doing political investigations. They were doing political hit jobs. They were going after parents at school board meetings. They were going after pro-life advocates. They were going after… the Catholic churches out of Richmond and trying to make that a widespread FBI policy. What he’s showing here is that by shifting the priorities back to police work and assisting local police forces, you can get real results. When you’re seeing that much percentage increase and even the fact that they’ve caught four on the FBI’s 10 most wanted list, that’s more than all of the Biden administration. And they’ve done that in six months. That’s showing real results to the American people. And to some degree, I think that there are people that are conservatives that were fans of Kash Patel that are buying in a little bit to what the media is putting out about there. They’re trying to show chaos. They’re trying to show that the FBI has low morale, that things aren’t happening the way they thought. But in reality, one, the FBI is doing the work they’re supposed to do. So if you haven’t seen quite the results yet on some of the higher profile things that you want, One, if they’ve done investigation, a lot of that is in the hands of the DOJ when we know that they’ve impaneled grand juries in some of those. So that’s out of the FBI’s hands. But also it shows this is the work of the FBI to make America safe again. That is what President Trump ran on. That is what the FBI’s changed from being a political organization that’s supposed to be quasi-independent, as they would say, because of law enforcement not directed by the president. But we saw… how that happened under the last administration that the law enforcement capacity of the American government was weaponized in a political fashion. They’re getting away from that. And these numbers really speak to that. It’s impressive. And I think that Kash Patel, the director, has done a good job of laying this out. And we’ll get to some more sound here in a second.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, I am curious. I see a lot of comments coming in. Some of them are not happy with Kash Patel, including people who have really say they don’t, I have a lot of trust in him at this point. I want to know much like what we have on certain guests. Uh, what is it? What was the tipping point for you? Why do you feel like you cannot trust this man anymore in this position? Cause it feel like you’re talking about a pretty strong name. Uh, cash Patel, Dan Bogino have, have kind of fulfilled that, that promise. Now look, everyone’s going to have issues. There’s going to be problems here and there, but the full lack of trust is when you have a fairly transparent, seems like a guy, uh, curious your thoughts. Tell me why. Give me a call or just put them in the comments as well. Again, at ACLJ.org, you can also share this show. You can read our blogs, check out all our new content for absolutely free. And if you can’t support financially, do that because this show only exists and our media side and our legal side only exists because people like you decide, I’d like to give a little bit of money to help support this broadcast, support our legal work. Because when you do that, we are not controlled. by any major sponsors, any major corporate overlords. We are fully independent because people like you decide to donate and to give and be a part of it. And we’re also not behind a paywall. So we’re not building an echo chamber. I think that’s incredibly important right now. Right now, when we look at the future of what society is going to look like, that we don’t build only these echo chambers that can result in extremes. You want people who are going to be honest with you, that’s going to tell you the truth. That’s what we do here. Whether you like it or not, whether you agree with it or not, we give you our honest assessment from the law, our honest assessment from the way media decides to manipulate you or have conversations with you. And look, you’ve heard from our offices at the ECLJ. You’ve heard from our offices in Jerusalem. Israel is under an immense amount of pressure right now. The kind of people that I’m seeing start to turn their back on Israel is starting to sort of shock me and concern me. We’re going to have a lot more discussion about that coming up in later days because it has been a whirlwind of about 48 hours to see such a shift. from the evangelical support of israel and then now seeing even some of your top leaders and we’re not just talking about some of the ones that have been allowed about it we’re seeing some of the ones who were i never would have expected uh start to uh waver their support of israel and really start rewriting biblical text even uh we’re going to talk about that coming up in the coming days but i’d love to hear from you at 1-800-684-3110 let’s go ahead and take a phone call though let’s go to ronald on rumble online one go ahead
SPEAKER 05 :
Yes, thanks for taking my call. Yes, I truly enjoyed the comments that you and Will had made concerning the contrast between the previous administration and the current administration. And I could see the frustration that Boyle had actually felt experience because of the fact of seeing all of the power of the FBI and the Department of Justice.
SPEAKER 08 :
I’m going to pause you for a second because I want, maybe Will can explain, people who don’t know what you’re referring to. We’re talking about O’Boyle, who was a whistleblower, Garrett O’Boyle, whose case was just resolved. Let’s give people, we’ll go right back to you, Ronald, but I realize that I do this sometimes when there’s brand new people, we don’t give them any context of what we’re talking about here. Give a little brief background.
SPEAKER 03 :
Garrett O’Boyle was an FBI agent that was a whistleblower trying to point out some of the misuse and weaponization and bias of the FBI. And as a result of that, he had a security clearance suspended and he was suspended without pay for years. And we fought alongside Empower Oversight. To get a resolution. He has now been reinstated to the FBI and with back pay and benefits for all that harm that was done to him and his family. We also secured one for Marcus Allen, very similar type circumstances. So Ronald’s just pointing out that this FBI is also bringing back people that were unfairly targeted for even blowing the whistle on their political.
SPEAKER 08 :
We may never hear from them again because now they are back again in Kash Patel’s oversight, if you will, which is pretty great. Let’s go back to you, Ronald, though. I just want to give people an understanding. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yes, sure thing. And that is why there was just a big contrast between the previous administration and the current administration and the fact that the numbers… Say it all, as Kash Patel was literally just explaining, the numbers literally just explains it all. And the children that were discovered, I mean, not just discovered, just rescued, because who knows what type of crime situation they would have been involved in, just rescued.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, 1,500 child predators and over 4,500, I believe, 4,700 child victims have been found by this FBI because of a 35% increase. Look, they could do nothing else. There could be zero other statistics showing good this FBI is doing, which, of course, there are great statistics. And that alone is worth it. That alone shows that we have such a changing of the guard here where we’re taking the most serious of cases serious, which, of course, there is nothing more serious than the victimization of children in this country.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, and to point out the hypocrisy of the left right now, they’re trying to say all these things are covering up for Epstein. When 4,700 victims have been found by the FBI, 1,500 child predators and 300 human traffickers have been arrested. So almost 2,000 perpetrators of these crimes against children. Those are huge numbers that cannot be overlooked, that the FBI is doing the real work of people that are still being victimized today, not what the left has all of a sudden co-opted as their own hit job against the president and something that cannot be prosecuted further. So we look at this and see real action and real numbers by the FBI that cannot be overlooked.
SPEAKER 08 :
When we get back, CeCe Hiles joining us. We have an update from Pakistan. A case that’s been going on for over a decade now where two Christian brothers were essentially charged with blasphemy and sentenced to death. And we got an update on that coming right up. Welcome back to Secular. We will take your phone calls, and phone lines are completely open right now at 1-800-684-3110. We’ve got a lot of people watching for it to be a completely open phone bank, so this is a good time to call in and have your voice heard. I always want to give an update, too, on the work of the ACLJ, of course, fighting for free speech and religious freedom around the world. This takes us to Pakistan and a KCC that’s been going on for quite some time, but we do have an update.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yes, we do. So this one is a case of, and you’ve heard us talk about this, Amun and Kaiser Ayub. And they were two brothers, Christian brothers in Pakistan, that back in 2011, there was a website that had a blog posted on it that contained allegedly blasphemous material.
SPEAKER 08 :
It’s been going on 14 years now.
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s exactly right. Now, on this website, the only thing that ties these brothers to any of this is that their contact information was on the website. And as we all know, if you’re going to create a website, you can put, anybody can create a website and put any information on there. There was no proof in this case at all tying these brothers that they had created the website or that they had created the content. Nevertheless, in 2014 and 2015, the end of 14 and 15, both of the brothers were arrested. So they have now been in prison for almost 11 years. We took this to the trial court. Our office in Pakistan has been representing one brother since the beginning, and now we represent both of the brothers. And I’ll explain that in a little bit, but in 2018 was the trial where they were found guilty and sentenced to death. And again, I’m going to point out there was no evidence. The prosecution had no evidence and provided no evidence that the website was created by these brothers or that the blog that allegedly contained blasphemous, and again, I’ll be like air quoting blasphemous because that’s ridiculous in itself, material, they could not prove that. yet these brothers were condemned and sentenced to death and then we appealed at the lahore high court and that court got it wrong and confirmed the death sentence and now we’re at the supreme court and this is the second time we’ve been at the supreme court and got a continuance and this is how we’re representing both of them is that about three months ago when we had the supreme court argument scheduled Kaiser Ayub, his attorney was not prepared and got a continuance. And that’s when Kaiser then hired us. So we represent both Amun and Kaiser in this case. Today, we were set for yet another oral argument before the Supreme Court in Pakistan. And now the prosecution said they were not prepared and got a continuance. So this is what we’re dealing with in Pakistan. These brothers have been in jail for almost 11 years and we continue to fight for justice.
SPEAKER 03 :
Cece, a couple of things I want to bring up here. One is that if you look at these cases, because this is different than the one we talked about last week, and we’ve had a litany of these cases that deal with this blasphemy law. And what it effectively does is it creates a weaponization of the government punishing people for what in America would be free speech. Now, the problem goes beyond that because just on its face, Even if the things that they were alleging the individual said were said by the individuals, it shouldn’t be a death penalty case anywhere in the world. It should be a free speech issue. We believe these are fundamental human rights enshrined in our Constitution. But granted to everyone, these are inalienable human rights that the right to free speech should not be something that the government brings a death penalty case against you on. Because of the weaponization of it, the majority in that country will use that as a weapon against people they don’t like, bring these claims. And in the lower courts, a lot of times when it’s provincial courts or in an area, a rural area or what have you, It’s not the same system as once it gets to the Supreme Court. So one, talk about the blasphemy issue because we have to fight that all over the world. Free speech is one of our main things that we go and protect here, not just in the United States, but around the world. But on top of that, these blasphemy laws that are still on the books, we can see good results at the Supreme Court of Pakistan. Yes. It ends up having people in prison with a death sentence for over a decade. And so a big portion of these kids’ life has been on death row in Pakistan.
SPEAKER 09 :
Absolutely. And I’ll quickly just say exactly those two things I’ll address. So just like you’re saying, these blasphemy laws are just used wrongly. And during the trial court back in 2018, the brothers testified that they had had a fight with a Muslim acquaintance and that he was the one that created the website and posted their names on it. So this is how it’s used. Blasphemy is used against Christians in Pakistan today. to condemn them. And even if they don’t ultimately get convicted, yes, they’ve spent a majority of their life. And I’m just going to point out that Amun’s wife, they were recently married right before his arrest. She has traveled every single week to meet with her husband. It’s a four-hour trip there and a four-hour trip back. And she has not missed a week visiting her husband in jail. Now talking about the Supreme Court, We do win these cases at the Supreme Court level because the Supreme Court sees the problem with blasphemy laws. And I think that’s why the prosecutor he was actually our attorney said when the prosecutor left today, he was high fiving other attorneys. It’s because they have absolutely then condemned these brothers to just more time. Now it’s just let’s see how long we can keep them in jail. So we hope when this gets scheduled again, hopefully in the next two or three months that we will have success and they will be released.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right, well, make sure we stay updated. Make sure you’re paying attention to what the ACLJ is doing worldwide. I always try to say, you know, we talk a lot about borders. We talk a lot about all those kind of things that happen. But the ACLJ operates around the world because we, as Will said, believe that these rights are God-given rights, whether that’s the freedom of speech or the freedom of religion, how you want to practice your faith. And, of course, in a lot of countries, it is not that way. We’re seeing that even in the Western world right now. We’re seeing that in a lot of other places where you would not expect it to be happening, places that Americans travel to quite a bit. But now we got to make sure that we are there. So whether that is at the UN, whether that’s representing Europe at the European Center for Law and Justice, whether that’s representing Israel at the ACLJ Jerusalem office, or many, many more, just like Pakistan, where we’re not even really talking a lot of times about where it is and what we’re doing, because it works a lot of times with people that are on death row. I mean, that’s what we’re talking about here. We’re talking about brothers that have been on death row for now going on a decade. This is a… you know when they start this whole thing started I just think back you know I have children who are you know borderline teenagers at this point now and they were not born yet when this all began um that is how long you got to put it into perspective. A lot of you are there watching right now. You were probably kids when this happened. We know we have a big demographic in that, you know, group, uh, under 30 said under 30 group. Yeah. You were probably a kid when this started happening. Uh, and I’d love to hear from you as we head into the second half hour of secular. We do have a whole, another second half hour. Some of your local stations don’t care. If you’re listening on radio, a lot of the local Christian radio talk stations, uh, they’ll move on to another ministry or some other conversation. If you want to keep this conversation going, The easiest thing to do is go to ACLJ.org or find us broadcasting live on YouTube or on Rumble. If you’re catching us later on, you can obviously watch the show on those platforms or later on, however you get your podcasts, you can find us there, of course, on ACLJ.org. No paywalls ever. We’re able to do that and operate because people like you support the work of the ACLJ. And that work could be this show or that work can be legitimately what CeCe is doing and her team is doing, which is making sure, doing whatever we can to keep these young Christians alive in Pakistan. Or it doesn’t even have to be Christians. People who are just wanting to proclaim their free speech, proclaim their freedom of religion. the proper way, the way that we believe, like you said, are God-given. We need your help to do that. Be their voice because it’s not too late to do that. When you support the work of the ACLJ, you pay for the incredible legal team, you pay for this media broadcast. Like I said, some of the stations you’re listening to right now, we may pay to be on. Why? So there’s no one telling us what we can and can’t say. And how refreshing is that? So I encourage you to stick with us for the second half hour. We got less than a minute coming up in a break and we got four lines open also at 1-800-684-3110. Give me a call right now back in less than a minute.
SPEAKER 04 :
Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 08 :
Welcome to Sekulow. Second half hour coming up and we are talking about a myriad of issues. But of course, the number one today is that Kash Patel, Will, was sitting for a Senate Judiciary Oversight hearing. This is something that happens. An FBI hearing. This happens fairly regularly. Should happen fairly regularly. This will be the first time that he’s really led one. But what he revealed was a lot of details. A lot of these details show where the FBI… Look, I see the comments coming in. Some of you have concerns with where Cash and where Dan have been leading the FBI, whether they’ve done the job you’ve hoped they’ve done. Well, when he leads you through the facts and the figures, the numbers are undeniable. Like I said, there’s a lot of different ones. 6,000 illegal firearms, 23,000 violent crimes or under 23,000. A lot of these issues are getting better and better. But the one that really stuck out to me, 1,500 child predators. arrested 4,700 child victims that have been found by the FBI. And that is a over 35% increase from the previous administrations. That is a shocking number. It’s a startling number that there aren’t one. You got to start putting into perspective. If 4,700 victims have been found, how many have not? How many are still out there? You’re talking about probably tens of thousands, if not more, just in our country. That’s a whole other issue that we hope to keep fighting and fighting. A lot of those are connected, too. The thing is, when you have organized crime, you have drug trafficking, a lot of times you have human trafficking. You have weapons, you have humans. A lot of times these are not necessarily guys who just deal in one or the other. They’re dealing in all kinds of crime, and we’ve got to make sure that we have a team put together and that we’re supportive, by the way, also, of a team that can speak into this and can get things done.
SPEAKER 03 :
That’s right. And most of the individuals, as the Senate and these oversight hearings have become, there was a lot of dullness to it because many of the Republicans tended to kind of give talking point answers, which were good, giving me the ability to, you know, showcase the good work of the FBI. And then many people on the left use it as just an attack, trying to get gotcha questions, etc. There was a few exceptions on both sides, obviously. But what I think was interesting is that how far one these oversight hearings have gone from providing true oversight as well as another purpose of this is for it to inform the Senate in this case or in the House if they have the House oversight hearings or Judiciary Committee hearings in the House is to inform the Congress on how they need to legislate. and when you see things like these numbers like 6 000 illegal firearms off the street why aren’t you hearing more people on the left that that is a big problem okay what are you doing right and how can congress support that mission to get more illegal firearms off the street like that i really like it i’m with the last uh sadly a couple weeks ago uh when the last school shooting happened um
SPEAKER 08 :
It was horrifying once again. And of course, we’ve had multiple since then. But the one that took the lives of children at that church school, Catholic school, I put up on my own private social media. I was like, look, I have said I am open to this conversation. I want to hear what you can say. How can we stop what’s going on? Violent crime. How can we stop what’s happening to our children with these shootings that are happening and occurring? I hate it. And I’m willing to listen. And I think that’s something that a lot of people are shocked to hear when you say, I’m willing to listen on any of these. Give me a solution that’s actually viable. And I’m happy to take it and champion it if I can believe in it. What I at least can now is turn to the FBI and say, you know what? Good work, team. We’re not there yet. But if we’re pulling thousands of weapons, illegal weapons off the streets, at least we’re getting somewhere.
SPEAKER 03 :
That’s right. And we have much more to break down of this, including some updates on the assassination investigation that was led by the FBI. And we will get into that in the next segment as well. There’s also things about the way that these attacks have started to play out against people of faith, against churches. Logan mentioned that horrific attack. school shooting at a Catholic school and in the Catholic Church building where they were having their first mass. Senator Hawley asked a question about these attacks there. So we’ll get into that and much, much more in the next segment of the broadcast. But also, if you’re interested in the information we were talking about, that case in Pakistan, where we are fighting for two brothers on death row in Pakistan, being accused of a blasphemy charge that is bogus and ridiculous, go to ACLJ.org. Support our work and learn more about that case there.
SPEAKER 08 :
Welcome back to Seculo. We are going to take your phone calls coming up some in this segment, some in the next at 1-800-684-3110. That’s 1-800-684-3110. We continue to follow Kash Patel before the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing this happening right now. And we actually have some sound we want to play. We want to make sure that you can, if you’re listening in video, if you’re watching, so you hear it from them, not just us giving you commentary on it. Because if you’re watching us, you’re probably not able to flip over and watch them at the same time.
SPEAKER 03 :
So Will, why don’t you give us a setup for this? That’s right. So this is following a discussion that Senator Hawley had with Director Patel about the investigation in the aftermath of the Charlie Kirk assassination, where Director Patel revealed that there are more than 20 individuals that they are are investigating, trying to get information on to make sure that there wasn’t any other people involved with that investigation. But this is where Senator Hawley broadened it out, the discussion, talking about what we’ve seen is violence against anti-religious violence, anti-Christian violence, and things of that nature, which have really expanded in the past few years. You’ve seen a lot of school shootings that have been religiously motivated. You’ve seen things that have been stopped by federal law enforcement in the past year or so. that were religiously motivated attacks on schools that have been thwarted. So this is a problem that the senator sees as growing. He asked this question, and I want you to hear the director’s response. This is bite 16 between Senator Josh Hawley and Director Patel.
SPEAKER 02 :
Let me just turn to the broader question here of anti-religious, anti-Christian violence. Let me just give you a few stats that I’m sure that you’re all too familiar with. Every person of faith in America certainly is. Major report this past year found that there had been over 400 instances of hostility against churches in the United States in the year 2024. Those included arsons, bomb threats, shootings and firearm incidents. One other organizational report found that there were 500 attacks on Catholic parishes alone. So that number 415, that’s all Christian churches in 2024. Another organization found 500 separate attacks on just Catholic parishes since May of 2020. Of course, we have the Covenant school shooting, the Annunciation school shooting in Minnesota where two children were shot dead as they were praying in a pew. Here’s my question. What is the FBI doing to take on this rising tide of violence that seems to be motivated by anti-religious hatred?
SPEAKER 01 :
Specifically, sir, we have 60 anti-Catholic hate crime incidences reported to us that are being investigated. Publicly, I can tell you we have five hate crime investigations with anti-Catholic bias ongoing currently in the cities of Kansas City, Louisville, Houston, Nashville, and Richmond. That’s what I can say publicly. But any… ideologically based attack against any faith, as a man of faith myself, will not be tolerated and the full resource of the FBI are committed to all of it.
SPEAKER 08 :
Again, that was Kash Patel. That’s happening as we speak right now. I think it’s, again, refreshing to even have those questions coming in from a Josh Hawley asking about the anti-Christian violence, anti-religious and anti-Christian violence, which obviously we’re seeing. We’re seeing maybe as brutally as we’ve ever seen before in modern times. Obviously, if you want to look at historical times, very different, but in modern times in this country. So what does that look like moving forward? And I think that’s what a lot of people have to decide. I think that’s what a lot of our listeners and viewers have to decide is what does the future look like? And we are hoping that there are people like this and there’s members of the FBI and our team here who can help reshape and lead a new direction for the country. As we are coming out of shock, we’re coming out of panic. But what does the next chapter look like?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, and if you even remember, and I’m not sure if this was in the list that Senator Hawley was referencing, we’re talking about the instances of hostility against churches and Catholic organizations as well. But if you’ll remember, even in the wake of the Dobbs decision, all the vandalism, firebombing, violent attacks against pregnancy resource centers that was under the Biden administration when this happened. And I believe maybe one person, one perpetrator was charged, maybe two, but no more than that. When there was dozens and dozens of instances of vandalism and violence against pregnancy resource centers. Instead, what was the FBI doing under the Biden administration? They were wanting to send undercover agents into Catholic churches. They were investigating parents at school board meetings that were standing up for their children. They were raiding in early morning hours the home of a pro-life advocate. And the federal government wasted time and money and resources on that case to lose in court. They brought the prosecution and lost in court to a jury of that man’s peers. And so what you’re seeing is a refreshing turn from the political FBI that we saw to one that is doing the job the American people want. 23,000 violent criminals just this year arrested by the FBI. And all those other stats we said, as well as taking seriously these ideologically driven attacks against people of faith in this country. That should not be something that Americans of faith are living under. I don’t care what faith you are. There should not be the fear of worshiping freely. We have the right to worship, to live out our faith in this country. And when groups decide that they want to target, I don’t care who you are, your right, your freedom to worship freely. That should not be acceptable and that should be a priority of the FBI. So I do love this new way that the FBI is going through this. I know that there have been bumps along the way because when you are revamping an agency that was wrought from within with all of this bias, there are going to be bumps along the way. I even think the transparency of Kash Patel has given more fuel to some of his detractors by being so transparent in real time. Maybe he needs to recalibrate some of that.
SPEAKER 08 :
Let’s talk about that. I want to take a call real quick. And look, phone lines are open. The next segment, I’m going to take as many calls as we can. This is probably the last call of this segment. But Brandon, Brian, stay on hold. We’re going to get to you and call in. Hopefully this inspires you to call in. John of Pennsylvania watching on the Salem News Channel. John, go ahead.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes, hi. Good afternoon. I just wanted to know, I’m getting a little concerned that Kash Patel, he’s going on TV stations and saying that he has found evidence of DNA and stuff against the assassin. And I’m almost positive it’s a case in Utah, and they’re going to be doing the prosecuting. So what role does the federal government have? Why is Kash Patel saying these things? Is he going to damage the case by letting these facts out?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, John, one, all of that evidence will be in court. It has to be available to the defense of the individual. So I don’t think anything there is anything abnormal than you would see in a press conference. Many times even the local law enforcement say we have found DNA evidence that ties this individual to the shooting. I don’t know that anything that I have heard personally would damage that. I’m not an expert on that. You’re deferring to the FBI.
SPEAKER 08 :
FBI, but you’re referring to Kash Patel, but also you’re talking about a topic that needs to be addressed on the country scale, on a federal scale. Even if it’s not prosecuted federally, a lot of people are turning to you and looking to you, and I think it’s fine. The FBI can help out where they can. There’s also local FBI chapters everywhere. So, of course, think they were on the scene within minutes. Right. there was members of the FBI team there in Utah.
SPEAKER 03 :
So they said they were able to provide air support, like getting assets in the air to help within minutes of the attack.
SPEAKER 08 :
So John, I know it’s a bit nuanced here, but I don’t believe you have anything here where Kash Patel is stepping too far into this situation that’s going to cause damage to the case. Now, the case itself shall be an interesting time because you now have more evidence that’s come out from the Charlie Kirk assassination, including an admission of guilt on a forum uh apparently from the like a discord apparently from the alleged shooter now again how admissible is that who knows because right now as we know he is not necessarily cooperating uh did turn himself in of course that’s never a great sign that this person did not do it um but of course when you have someone who’s not fully admitting it it’s going to go to trial it’s going to be an interesting time
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, and I want to bring up a point to that as well. We had Beverly on YouTube say the FBI is a joke. They didn’t find Charlie Kirk’s killer. The dad turned him in. Had high hopes for cash. Very disappointed. The Boston Marathon bombings. The FBI didn’t release the images and photos of the individuals until three days after the bombings in Boston. And there was obviously a citywide manhunt looking for these individuals. And it took them three days to get to the point where they released the photos. And then the photos, individuals said, we know who those people are. And that led to what was a chaotic manhunt. One of them ended up being killed. In a boat? Bombs being thrown out of the back of the vehicle, injuring people. The way this happened was they had this person in custody in 33 hours. They did the steps. When they exhausted their leads, they put the photo out. Someone recognized them. It was able to negotiate a peaceful handover. so that no one else got hurt.
SPEAKER 08 :
I’m seeing that commentary a lot, especially from your Dan Abrams and some of these others that are saying, you know, this just proves that Cash Patel and these guys don’t know what they’re doing. And I’m glad Cash led with, well, here’s the numbers that’s really going on. Sure. Is this unfortunate? Are there things that could have been done to hopefully prevent tragedies like this in the future? Absolutely. Do I think someone dropped the ball? Absolutely. Absolutely. We’ll talk about that coming up as well. Give me a call, 1-800-684-3110. Again, 1-800-684-3110. We’ve got three lines open for you, so it is a perfect time to call in. If you’re on hold, stay on hold. We’re going to get you coming up in just a minute because in this last segment, we want to hear from you. We’ll be right back with more Wrap Up Cyclo. Welcome back to Seculo. We are going to take your phone calls now at 1-800-684-3110. Let’s kick this off with Brandon, who’s calling, who’s an ACLJ champion. I want to explain to those who don’t know what that is. That is someone that gives like a membership, gives every month reoccurring. They set it up and it’ll give and donate to the ACLJ each and every month. Now, one of the little perks I like to offer, again, it’s not even official, doesn’t say it on the website, but if you call and you tell the phone screener you’re a champion and it matches up. We like to bump you to the front of the line because I feel like that’s just a nice thank you to those that give on a recurring basis. And if you’re a donor right now, you can opt in and become a champion. If you’ve never donated before, you can do that at any level, by the way. But what that does is help us create a great baseline for support. So thank you so much to all our champions out there. If you are a champion, it’s not too late to call in. It’s not too late to call in in general. It’s at 1-800-684-3110. Brandon, go ahead.
SPEAKER 07 :
I thank you for all you do. You guys are awesome. I didn’t have, I’m going to try to make this very quick. I witnessed on TV, I was four years old and I witnessed president Kennedy being shot. Then Martin Luther King and then Bobby Kennedy and then a temp on president Reagan and now president Trump. What I, I realized that Charlie Kirk did not have the security that they hold, but If you’re going to show up at these events, some of the people need to get involved and start watching the tree lines and the buildings. But binoculars are something to make sure people are safe. You don’t have to be in security, but just be watching. And I’d like to say also there’s two gentlemen behind Charlie doing baseball singles. One’s in a white shirt and a ball cap and glasses. Another guy’s in a black shirt, ball cap and glasses. And they’re giving like baseball signals. Are they giving the okay to lock and load?
SPEAKER 08 :
I think those have been addressed the last part. No, those were some of Charlie’s best friends and personnel who has been with his team for a very, very long time. Those were not people doing that. Of course, they had full production and media there and they’re constantly in communication. with that team so you when you see that looks like they may be signaling someone they’re talking to probably members of that team they’re getting the next person ready to ask a question so i don’t want to spread any more of that i know people are very personal close friends with those two specifically one of them um who again they were they were real friends and supporters of Charlie. So no, that’s not what that is. Unless, you know, if nothing will, will convince me otherwise, unless some reason, you know, there’s some big breaking news out of that, because what I’ve seen from that is just purely speculation in terms of though security at these events. I think that that is something we need to address because when videos started coming out and immediately people who just had their iPhone videos could identify where this shooter came from and you could see them on the roof. And that all of a sudden became verifiable that that was real. I think you’re right in the sense of we need to take that much more seriously. You’re not talking about someone who was, I mean, they were quite a bit away still from them, but I don’t disagree with you. I think if you’re a college and you’re planning on these events, there needs to be a stronger security program. And look, there may need to be a temporary things where you held these events inside, you hold them in different spaces that can be easier to control. uh you know if they had held this in the auditorium there i don’t know how big it is but let’s say it’s a couple thousand people would it have been that less amount of people who would have been able to fit in that room probably not you probably could have that in an overflow room with real security that goes in maybe for the time that needs to be what this is before we move on to out in the public square in these uh student unions or student spaces i understand why you want to have them there the visual is is wild and is impressive But let’s also not jump to conspiracy theories, I think, with this. I know a lot of you are going to ask questions, and that’s okay to ask questions, why certain things happened, why certain things didn’t. But when we start placing blame with no knowledge, like I love that you’re a champion and a supporter, but… You can probably do your digging right now and figure out who those guys are immediately. I don’t even want to say their names. I don’t want to put any of them at risk any more than they already have. These were not anything nefarious from what we’ve seen. Let’s continue on. Another champion’s calling in. Terry’s calling on line two. Terry in Missouri, go ahead.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yes, sir. I was wanting to say as a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, anywhere that we were at on patrol, we made sure that we owned the rooftops. And I would like to see this on a federal level since it’s happening at a federal level. You will be shot on site or at least arrested if you’re found on a rooftop.
SPEAKER 08 :
Terry, we’ve seen back to back now the same thing. Right. It’s hard not to jump to those kind of conclusions like why wasn’t this when you know from President Trump and now to Charlie Kirk. Both of them, by the way, had successful shots fired. Both of them killed people in the moment. President Trump’s life was spared, but we know the person who was there behind him was not. Obviously, Charlie’s life was not spared. We know that this is a trend. So, Terry, I don’t know about the exact final protocols of that, but to secure the roofs, I don’t think there’s… We can’t disagree with you.
SPEAKER 03 :
And at that level as well, that wouldn’t have been the federal government involved at this campus in Utah, but what you would have is you have campus police that are Knowing that they have to help secure an event, there’s the private security there as well. But campus police, that’s their jurisdiction. That’s where they protect. And knowing that there are that many rooftops and buildings, we can’t speculate what was told to whom and when because we just don’t know. But I agree with you, Terry. It does seem that that is something that is lacking. It’s a glaring problem that should not have happened.
SPEAKER 08 :
I don’t even think that there’s a question there. Because again, if your iPhone video is good enough to see this person on a roof, the security people who are in charge of this should also know that that’s a space that they need to be following. We’re going to continue on. We’ve got three minutes, two calls. Let’s go ahead and take Joe, who’s calling in Texas, who is watching on the Salem News Channel. Kind of a similar question, but Joe, I think it’s okay to say this as well. Yes, sir.
SPEAKER 07 :
Well, I’m just thinking why do they not fly surveillance drones at any large-scale event?
SPEAKER 08 :
Look, Joe, I don’t know that they didn’t. I don’t know that they didn’t at this specific event, but we also do know that that is not uncommon. I’ve been to many arenas and concerts and stadiums recently where they are flying surveillance drones. They are watching you. They are running facial recognition scans. A lot of times when you walk in,
SPEAKER 03 :
look at or look around the stadiums you walk in now they pretty much tell you we’re scanning your face and we’re going to let you in or not let you in based on who you are and we know who you are so that is happening well and the resources at a large stadium that is a billion dollar industry probably at the individual stadium is a lot different than utah valley university this is a A college that many people had never heard of until this event. This wasn’t even BYU or the University of Utah. It was a place that seems to have a smaller student population. The campus footprint is smaller. It’s not something that necessarily would have as many resources. And it’s probably not used to very large events on their campus. Yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
not sure who would have been technically in charge or responsible for security we know that there was failure there okay i mean there’s there’s no doubt on my mind that there was now how you address that moving forward is how we’re going to see i’m sorry we didn’t get to get through the other call uh call in tomorrow we’ll do our best to get you i apologize you’re on hold for a long time what’s that you want to address the what the caller said or i don’t even
SPEAKER 03 :
know what the comment was. It was a reference to what President Trump and the DOJ had said that they were looking at labeling Antifa a terrorist organization and that’s made a lot of news so we can quickly address there is no designation within the government, like a foreign terrorist organization, which allows the Treasury to do sanctions and sanction people that work with them. From what it appears, that would be more just internally how they investigate things or the tracking of Antifa activity. But it’s not the same as a foreign terrorist organization designation that you see on Hamas, on the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, So that did make a lot of news, but I think it’s more of just a way that the FBI investigates and other law enforcement would investigate crimes that they believe were responsible at the hands of Antifa members, but it’s not quite the same as a foreign terrorist organization.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right, hopefully that answers your question. With that, I encourage you to go to ACLJ.org, support the work of the ACLJ. Keep praying for our team. Pray for the Turning Point team, the Kirk family. Pray for our friends and family in Israel as well. A lot of places to pray right now, and just go do it. talk to you tomorrow
