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On today’s Sekulow, Logan and Jordan Sekulow break down the realities of the latest government shutdown. While the media spins panic, the show separates fact from fiction, explaining which services will continue, how federal employees are impacted, and why much of the fear is political theater. With calls from listeners across the country, the discussion also dives into the political blame game between Democrats and Republicans, the ongoing battle over Planned Parenthood funding, and the deeper question of government bloat. Plus, the ACLJ highlights its ongoing legal battles, from defending pro-life advocates to exposing surveillance abuse under the Quiet
SPEAKER 12 :
Today on Seculo, we have the inside scoop on the government shutdown. We’ll tell you everything you need to know.
SPEAKER 11 :
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 12 :
The government may be shut down, but we’re here still doing a show for you. Welcome to Sekulow. My brother, Jordan Sekulow, will be joining us in studio shortly, but right now it’s just me and you. So let’s talk this through. We’re going to break down what this government shutdown means, why all of your friends are calling you screaming, saying it’s the end of the world, and why for many of us who have been through this government shutdown before many times, you know it’s not. Maybe just that your friends finally started paying attention to the news. They probably never even noticed that the government has shut down so many times in their lifetime. But this will be the first shutdown since the record. We’ll go through some of this record. 35-day closure that was in 2018 during President Trump’s first term. We do have a breakdown we’re going to go through. Kind of Leading you through, there are, you know, look, there’s no good to this. No one wants a government shutdown, but we are going to break down what it actually means, how it’s going to affect your daily life. There are some things, depending on your job, obviously, if you work for the government, there will be things that do get affected. public parks, public museums, a lot of those in Washington, D.C. Many of those will be shut down as of today. Those are the kind of things that start happening as the government has to figure out how to get back to work after they fail to pass a spending bill. And this spending bill, by the way, and this is what it says, it says on September 19th, I’ll read it for you, the House passed a short-term continuing resolution extending existing spending levels for government operations until November 21st, my 40th birthday. So you know what? Happy birthday to me. I get to celebrate a government shutdown. That’s great. House Republicans adjourned and leadership in town. They called it back into session in 48 hours. There’s a lot of different things this will go through, including what they wanted, what the Democrats wanted. They wanted things like restricting executive authority. They’re upset after Doge. They are upset about Big Beautiful Bill. And of course, the restrictions on Planned Parenthood, all things. the things that you would fully expect them to be mad about and of course they are i want to hear a lot from a lot of people on capitol hill today i want to make sure you’re hearing the voices you should be hearing let’s start just right off the top can we go to mike johnson let’s go to represent mike johnson uh take a listen there’s nothing new in this legislation there’s no poison pill there’s no partisan tricks there’s no gimmicks whatsoever the only difference today is the man who is sitting in the oval office
SPEAKER 02 :
rather than work with President Trump and Republicans to get this job done. As our party has done repeatedly in the same situation over the years, Democrats want to play political games with the lives and the livelihoods of Americans. The simple truth is Democrats in Congress have dragged our country into another reckless shutdown to satisfy their far-left base. That is the truth. Whether or not the government remains open or reopens is entirely up to them. There’s still time for Democrats to pass this clean bipartisan bill that’s sitting before them. And we encourage our Democrat colleagues to do that. I certainly pray they’ll come to their senses soon and do the right and responsible thing.
SPEAKER 12 :
Of course, that’s from Mike Johnson. You know, one thing maybe happens with a government shutdown. Windscreens on microphones, not as easily accepted. You know, you don’t have good ones. That’s what happens. They start really putting in the bad windscreens. Sorry about that for some of the sound difficulties there. You can blame the government shutdown. That’s what happens. Phone lines are open for you. What do you think about this? What do you think about this government shutdown? 1-800-684-3110. We’ll get some other topics as well today. Of course, Israel still in the news. We’ll be talking about that as Hamas has a little bit of time still to respond. There are some good signs. There are some good indications overnight that they may be headed towards a deal. We will see, though. Again, as everyone kind of waits a little bit on bated breath for that actually to wrap up. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. 1-800-684-3110. Have your voice heard today. Always support the work of the ACLJ. We’re kicking off October. Kick it off strong. The government may be shut down, but we’re still open for business here. We’re out there defending your religious liberties, your free speech rights, and even in the face of people trying to criminalize and silence us, we’re not going to have that happen. So today we have a vital deadline defending even a parent who’s being sued by a teacher for defamation. We also are appealing a FOIA case. We had so much going on. They gave me a whole list of things. Tomorrow we’re filing to stop a far-left attorney general from suing our client who’s a preacher who just want to pray outside Planned Parenthood. We got so much to talk about and so much going on. We’re not going anywhere, but we can’t do that without your help. So go to ACLJ.org, make your donation today. We’ll be right back. Welcome back to Secular. My brother Jordan Secular is now joining us in studio, a man who has lived through a lot of government shutdowns in his time, including in Washington, D.C. Again, you do have to call your friends probably because a lot of them are going to be panicking because you hear the words government shutdown. And I mean, for goodness sake, it doesn’t mean exactly what they want you to believe it is. Now, it’s not a good thing. It certainly is going to hurt. It’s there to hurt President Trump. It’s there to hurt the Trump administration. So let’s not sit here and pretend it’s nothing. But it’s certainly not the doom and gloom in times of which they say.
SPEAKER 13 :
Right. It’s all about who gets the blame at the end of the day. Right. So the left, I think, is so low at this point. And Chuck Schumer and the Hakeem Jeffries have been by the leftist like AOC and kind of who’s winning the primaries in the upcoming midterms are being pushed out and are clearly not identifying with the people who are still that 30% of Democrats giving money, right? So they thought they had to make a stand here and that they could still blame the Republicans. The issue is they’ve already lost three in the Senate. So I think they needed 10 total. They’re going to keep having these votes. Now, when this gets tougher, I’d say, is after a week. I’d say then you start feeling it. Well, the trash starts piling up in DC. You start wondering, you know, people that got furloughed. Museum workers. It’s kind of like this. Imagine when you like turn off everything and if you left your house and then you came back in a month, no one checked on anything. And there’s, you know. You got to put the pieces back together. The rats come out more. The bugs are out more. I mean, there’s no… They’re in there working, and there’s no one to take trash. So, like, it piles up. But if that’s the worst of what we’re talking about here, people are nervous about Social Security, not an issue. People worry about Medicaid, not an issue. Hospitals, not an issue. Military gets their pay, continues. So, security, not an issue.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, let’s actually go through. This is the list. They have what service and programs continue during government shutdown. As you said, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid payments will all continue. Most veterans programs will continue. Air traffic control and TSA will continue. So again, if you’re flying out, don’t worry. There’s still that option. Federal law enforcement and border patrol. Military personnel will stay on duty. Student aid for higher education. The Postal Service. At least it’s funded by postage, it says. In fact, approximately 23% of federal employees will be furloughed, while 77% will continue to work. Right, because they’re considered essential? No, it’s still… There’s nothing to laugh at, 23%.
SPEAKER 13 :
That is a lot of people. A lot of people. But for instance… different federal agencies have different budgets for these moments. So federal courts, and I was just confirming this for everybody because this one is one you could see is either going to wrap up fast or because the Dems are looking for anything, it’s going into the midterms. Anything to put the pain to them. Even to try to prove not just to Republicans. but I’m talking about some of these guys who are up for their own issues with primaries and things like that, that they should still be in charge, the current Democrat leadership. So I get a little nervous with that. It’s how long they can keep the five or six or seven more moderates they need from breaking. These Democrats would not be voting to say, I agree with everything in here. It’s a continuing resolution to then have this debate longer. I don’t like that government has to work this way, and it shouldn’t come to this. But you do need to know where the blame lies. And on this, Republicans were not trying to do anything drastic. It was to keep things exactly as they are. So it just meant no new funding. The Democrats wanted another like a trillion dollars of spending.
SPEAKER 12 :
I think it was a half a trillion dollars or something like that. They basically wanted to restore everything that they lost in the last budget battle. In the big beautiful bill and in the Doge cuts and all that. Of course, what they really wanted… Was Planned Parenthood to be backfunded? All of those things that are they, you know, what will maybe win them some votes? Yeah, the Democrats put forward their own funding bill, which would increase spending from one to one point five trillion in exchange for one month of continued funding. Is that right? One point five trillion. That’s pretty wild. Let’s go ahead and let’s take a call.
SPEAKER 13 :
That’s a non-starter. Did you see the picture that the White House released? Do we have the picture of the White House released? We should grab it. President Trump, it’s kind of a view of the side. And he’s almost laughing in their face. And he tossed them his hats.
SPEAKER 12 :
Oh, yeah, I saw.
SPEAKER 13 :
I did see that. Because, again, he was laughing at them because he knows they’re not serious. He knows they’re just playing politics. And they’re going to try to go out there and say, see, they’re going to let your grandmother suffer because she’s not going to get the medication. None of that is true. If you hear anything like that, I believe it’s harder for them to tell that story now, too, because. regular left-leaning mainstream media doesn’t control the info the uh sources it’s not that people like this though you’re panicking let me let me tell you something it’s not good no from most people other than the trash piling up in places that affects federal employees barely gonna feel it right for now really actually think about after this ends Did you feel any difference?
SPEAKER 12 :
Well, that’s what I said. Most people don’t even realize they’ve probably lived through many of these. And didn’t know what’s happening. They’re just now politically attuned. They’re now just watching the news and paying attention. They likely went through the one in 2018. Yes. I mean, if you’re an adult now, there’s a good chance you’re an adult or a teenager at the youngest then. If you’re listening to this show. Let’s take one of these phone calls. A lot of people are calling.
SPEAKER 13 :
People have lived through a lot. Because it’s not so much the economic side. So they try to make it about… Again, your grandparents and your retirees and security.
SPEAKER 12 :
Not affected. Let’s take Bill in Wyoming. Bill, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 03 :
Thanks, sir. Let me share this with you. I think it’s kind of interesting because way back when H.W. Bush was president, he promised no new taxes. And unfortunately, when they come to this type of a deal, the Democrats had to rush in a… emergency spending bill for the people that were suffering from a natural disaster, and they slid in the tax increase on top of that. Then they went to the press crying about how President Bush is being mean to those who are suffering from this natural disaster. And let’s not forget about Clinton, when he had that problem, because I was going to school with somebody who was on Social Security, And they were basically saying the same thing. And they’re using this language to scare people into saying, hey, let’s go ahead and decide with these guys. I think that’s kind of interesting. What about you?
SPEAKER 13 :
Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, ultimately when it comes down to all of these issues, I think it’s a great question. I don’t think they can. We just were talking about it. Do they get away with using it in the news? Will they have mainstream media friends who do that for them? Sure, because it’s the news and they want you to watch it. Yeah, so they’ll have the ticker running. But anybody telling you this is pushing grandma off the cliff kind of story, is a lie as an outright lie. And I think you are right, Bill. They will probably at some point learn that when, when you’re the party who actually has caused this, you can’t just blame the majority party when it takes at least 10 of your people to, to keep the government going. And you’re the reason why. And so there’s enough of us telling this story today. And what, like Logan said, um, Make it clear. You know, take that list, post it to your social media. Make sure you know it when your friends reach out to you. Because if you’re watching or participating in this show, podcast, however you do it, over the air, watching the broadcast, watching YouTube later. you’re the kind of person that people are going to come to because they know that you actually pay attention to this kind of information.
SPEAKER 12 :
Maybe one of my friends who’s on our side say, hey, give me the information I can now send to my friends because they’re panicking and I know you’re going to tell me the truth here, so send it to me. So yeah, make sure you do that. Follow this show, follow all our pages, and maybe we can even post that list somewhere. Yeah, there’s some things that I don’t like.
SPEAKER 13 :
I don’t know, it’s not good. Your trip to Washington, D.C. stinks if you can’t go to the museums.
SPEAKER 12 :
You can’t go to Smithsonian.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yes, but usually this is resolved Republicans will give the Democrats a chance to resolve this today, tomorrow, and I would imagine it’s either solved by the weekend or we might have prepared for something longer. I actually, we’re starting to do it in our office. We’ve got things coming up and we have a date in mind that if the shutdown is continued to that date, things that we had planned were going to move to the next month. So again, we’re affected by it to that extent, but our attorneys are still in federal court. So those courts are running. It’s just kind of like the Postal Service. They have their own budgets and their own kind of rainy day funds. So unless you get… Historically, we’ve never seen one. What was the longest it was? We’ve already been through it recently.
SPEAKER 12 :
The last one was 35-day closure in 2018.
SPEAKER 13 :
So, I mean, again, you have to get really into this deeply to where your tone changes, you say this is out of control. We’re not even close to that point. In fact, the government today is still working because they have to be there to shut it down. So as they put out, by OMB put out, everybody has to report to duty tomorrow to actually put the shutdown policies into place.
SPEAKER 12 :
even the people who are going to be furloughed. All right, we’re going to be taking your calls and comments coming up. A lot of you called in. So stay on hold if you’re on hold right now. We will do our best to get to all of you because I know a lot of you have questions or just statements and you want to vent. That’s fine. We’re here for you. It’s a Wednesday. We can do that. We’re also going to talk about some of the other topics as well today. But right now we’re going to stick on this because it seems to be what you all want to talk about because there has been more information come out about how the TSA targeted our friend Tulsi Gabbard. We’re going to talk about that. And we’re also going to talk about the situation involving Israel and Gaza and what this new deal may look like as there have been some other concessions and apologies made. As history keeps moving forward in that, we’ll see where we end up. Again, phone lines are open for you. Give us a call. But in the meantime, as we said, the government shut down. We’re not. That’s because people like you. Go to ACLJ.org and make a donation today. We’ll be right back. Welcome back to Steculo. We are going to take your calls and comments on this because we had a lot of people calling in. Do you want to give an update on the Quiet Skies situation?
SPEAKER 13 :
We had our team, obviously, you know, we not only Tulsi Gabbard worked with us here before. Again, her job is DNI. And of course, we have Rick Grinnell, who was the former DNI. But we also represented her. as she was working at ACLJ with us as part of the time period when she was out of elected office and really kind of explaining to people her full move out of the Democrat Party, why she felt like she had no place left and kind of actually didn’t just feel like she needed to be independent, but felt like the Republican Party was her new home.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, it was two steps. She went independent, released the book, and then said, you know what?
SPEAKER 13 :
And then, of course, while that happens, she travels a lot. She’s fairly high profile, doing a lot of speaking and events. And she’s noticing she keeps getting that designation on her boarding pass. I’ve gotten it before.
SPEAKER 12 :
My wife has gotten it before.
SPEAKER 13 :
It’s supposed to be random. Random. And again, to get it over and over again, to have agents on the plane, and it was getting kind of personal too, like going through her personal belongings in front of people. So you would go through security, and then oftentimes she would have to do it again at the gate, and sometimes they would take her to a back room. But again, this is just, it’s personally, you feel like, listen, I didn’t do anything wrong, so nothing’s going to actually happen to me, but I’m being actively spied on.
SPEAKER 04 :
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 13 :
And then we find out three more Republican members of Congress, only Republican, this was happening to also. So you have the government using a power that is supposed to protect us from terrorists to surveil and kind of, I think, kind of make life tougher, just like, you know, kind of show them, hey, we’re the ones in charge. Using power in the worst way. because of people’s politics. And again, when the government ever faces any moves like this over politics, Logan, I mean, that’s the worst of the federal government. And so what I love about the hearing and the ACLJ’s work on this, and let me thank our donors again, because these are tough, complicated cases, especially we took it on in the administration that was in charge. And Rand Paul said, Senator Paul said, this was only uncovered because of Tulsi. And we uncovered it with her right here on this broadcast. And now that we uncover it, we fought back and represented her.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, absolutely. We actually have a bite from earlier this year. So this is from January this year of Tulsi Gabbard speaking about this, speaking about specifically the Quiet Skies program. When was this and where was this? Just so I know, so I can give people information. This was during her confirmation hearing. Okay, so let’s take a listen to Tulsi Gabbard.
SPEAKER 06 :
Biden, the FBI abused its power for political reasons to try to surveil Catholics who attend traditional Latin mass, labeling them as quote unquote radical traditionalist Catholics. Personally, just 24 hours after I criticized Kamala Harris and her nomination, I was placed on a secret domestic terror watch list called Quiet Skies. Sadly, there are more examples. The bottom line is this. This must end.
SPEAKER 12 :
Remember, this is what we were living through. I mean, I think it became very normal for all of us. And maybe you’re very quick to forget. You’re very quick to move on. It’s why, you know, we’ve always had to say the only thing difference is like when we start talking about the FBI now or the DNI and those kind of things. I have to reframe my mind to not immediately think of corruption and it’s like, what are we talking about? Because so much in so many years, I mean, really, even during the first Trump presidency, we were dealing with a lot of it’s just the beginning of draining the swamp.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yeah. I mean, so much of what, when you talk to Rick Grinnell, I mean, he was basically brought in as DNI after Ambassador to Germany to say, you know what, we’ve got to kick this off because even the first people put in place were not tough enough to fight the bureaucracy. What was already built in, yeah. And so it started with Rick and then now Tulsi, someone who has seen the abuse of this is, is in charge. So they have a massive job of not only the main job of DNI, which is to keep us safe and to make sure our intelligence agencies are working together to keep us safe from terrorism, protect Americans, protect American troops, uh, And using it in the most effective way. It’s also about not letting people use this for the unconstitutional and illegal ways because of politics or because of views that you have. And so the fact that it was not just Tulsi, which we assumed it would not be, but because she was brave enough to come and speak out about it. We now know three other people. They said, wait, this was happening to me too. And again, that doesn’t mean that tomorrow if you fly and this is on your… No, it does happen randomly to people. But if after every flight, and if you start noting that there’s air marshals sitting next to you or behind you, yes.
SPEAKER 12 :
Go to our website. Go to aclj.org slash help. Especially if you’re someone who’s very active on social.
SPEAKER 13 :
That helps people. Like Tulsi, it helps the people inside the Trump administration. There’s thousands upon thousands of people here with this kind of power. So they want to route out the bad guys, the bad operators. Sometimes they’re able to do that on their own. But again, it always helps if you have people come and say, this is happening to me.
SPEAKER 12 :
And this is who’s doing it. Absolutely. We’re looking right now, if you’re watching any other news, they’re showing live shots of the floor right now. I just want to say, tell me those people look like they’re panicking and it’s the end of the world. No, you got people giggling and laughing in the corner. All of your bureaucrats and your senators and congresspeople are all… Don’t feel like this is the end of the world the way they make it feel. It’s uncomfortable. It’s not great. But you can see the seriousness on there. Look at their faces. Their faces tell me it’s not, you know, is there anything they’re playing cards with you? They’re not playing cards with themselves. Let’s go ahead and take another phone call about this. Let’s do the government shutdown. We can talk more about Tulsi as well if you want to call in. Let’s go to Brian who’s calling in Virginia. Brian, go ahead.
SPEAKER 05 :
Hey, guys. I’m just so upset. Just so upset about what’s going on with this government shutdown. I’m actually at the hospital now in the emergency room, and I’m getting treated for government shutdown-itis, which is actually a real thing.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, I mean, did they not? There’s no one there to see you, right?
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, well, it wasn’t a government hospital I had to go to. It was civilians, so I’m good to go. I mean, this is the thing.
SPEAKER 13 :
For most Americans… Will not feel an impact. I’m not saying that no one will. Of course people will. They said 25% of the federal government. They will get back pay. Yeah, furloughed. So if they were supposed to get their paycheck next week and they were still shut down, that paycheck is coming. And they’ve been through it before if they’ve worked for the federal government in the last five years. So they know that the check is coming. Now, President Trump did say this. You want me to fire more people? Because the American people are about to see that we could probably keep all this going without at least 25%.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, I think that’s what happens. Look, it happened, sadly, a lot during COVID. I think a lot of people realized their businesses were bloated. Unfortunately, I mean, it costs a lot of people jobs, but you realized, oh, we have gotten a bit in an American culture where we are overstuffing a lot of our organizations. Obviously, the government has been for years. We don’t want to cause anyone to lose their jobs, but it becomes a little bit more of a reality. No, right.
SPEAKER 13 :
It’s not like the person who’s just a good civil servant should be punished here. At the same time, if your bureaucracy is so bloated that your debt and the spending is out of control, that that civil servant, even if they lose their job, ultimately that might be better for them financially and their family. In a few years, even, they might be recovering better because of what else happens if we don’t get the spending under control.
SPEAKER 12 :
First half hour flew by. We want you to continue being part of this conversation. We do have a second half hour of the broadcast coming up. It’s me and Jordan. We’re talking it all out, talking government shutdown.
SPEAKER 13 :
To be able to answer to your friends too. Yeah. Use this broadcast because we’re here. We’ve got the info. So 1-800-684-3110. And don’t feel bad about any questions.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, we can walk you through the next.
SPEAKER 13 :
I’ve been walking through my mind saying, okay, which one does get, which one doesn’t? Because I want to be very clear to you. So call us.
SPEAKER 12 :
And we’ll also walk through what the Democrats want and why, of course, it’s a non-starter for a lot of Republicans. We’ll talk about that coming up and so much more. But as always, support the work of the ACLJ at ACLJ.org. Catch the second half hour. If you don’t get it on your local station, on all our social platforms, ACLJ.org. And of course, on YouTube and however you get your podcasts.
SPEAKER 11 :
Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 13 :
But Schumer has been able to keep enough Democrats on board that they don’t reach 60 votes to make this basically a shutdown that never happened.
SPEAKER 12 :
I want to hop to a call real quick about this shutdown. Chris in Arizona, on line four. Chris, watch on the Salem News Channel, which we’re on live every day from 12 to 1 p.m. Go ahead, Chris.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thanks for having me. I just wanted to say, you know, these shutdowns, they’re going to keep happening. These guys are acting like little kids throwing pepper tantrums because they’re not getting their way. Until we figure out a way to make them pay and be held accountable for these shutdowns, they’re going to continue to happen.
SPEAKER 12 :
That’s what I was saying, Chris. When you saw the floor and the votes happening right now, you don’t tell me that that group of people looks like they’re absolutely panicking.
SPEAKER 13 :
You want to even go a step further? They do not. usually the Senate senators will leave town because of Yom Kippur.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yep.
SPEAKER 13 :
And they’re planning on doing that still.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, and that starts tomorrow.
SPEAKER 13 :
Now, I’m not saying that that’s not a very important, the most important holiday of the Jewish faith. And it’s important, but again, the idea that they’re going to leave. And the government still shut down.
SPEAKER 12 :
It also shows that they don’t think that we’re close to having a deal done. Not close or and also not in crisis. Yeah. It doesn’t feel that way. Okay. Honestly, even when it’s not your number one news story for a lot of people. I mean, yes, I did get a lot of calls, but there’s a lot of talk still about other things, including Hamas. President Trump saying, you know, they’re giving them two or three days to make the call. Of course, I’m sure he’s trying to push it for them to do it on, I don’t know, maybe during one of these holidays during Yom Kippur, which is happening starting tonight as Hamas has kind of an ultimatum deal. And then look, President Trump kind of doubled down on that ultimatum and said, look, if they don’t do this. Israel, do what you got to do. And pretty much gave almost an approval to go in and finish the job in a way that will be probably devastating for Hamas and for Gaza in general.
SPEAKER 13 :
And it’ll be very hard for the… Because the rest of the Arab world supports this, is willing to send their troops… to secure Gaza so that it’s not the IDF doing that, to put themselves in harm’s way and use their resources, that, again, you can’t blame Israel.
SPEAKER 12 :
And this even happened, look, there’s news reports that Hamas operatives, we just started talking about this, were arrested in Germany. And we’re not talking about like financial guys, we’re talking about people that were trying to, I mean, this is from the Washington Post, German authorities arrested three men, this was just a few hours ago, suspected of being members of Hamas, uh, and procuring weapons to carry out attacks on Jewish or Israeli institutions in Germany. I guarantee you though, or I can’t guarantee you, but likely I assume that’s because of the holidays coming up. Police seized weapons, including an AK 47 assault rifle, several pistols, significant amount of ammunition while arresting the men in Berlin. Two of them are German citizens. Uh, and one is a Lebanese born. So again, they know that this is happening now around the world. Things have to look, it’s something we all got to be careful about. Um, There’s not much you can do, but thankfully, the German government was able to step in, the police force, and stop what was happening there. But remember that this is all happening in real time as we try to focus on this. And look, maybe later on, if you’re hearing this show tomorrow, day after tomorrow, hopefully we can say, hey, the war is over, and you’re listening to this, and we’re talking about old news. That would be great. So, you know, pray for everybody there that that may happen. Hey, we’re going to the next segment. Phone lines have one line open right now. This is a fast moving show today. We’re going to take as many of the calls as we can. Absolutely. And we’re also going to walk you through a bit more of the show.
SPEAKER 13 :
And our team is working on this at the ACLJ, our government affairs team. to make sure you have the right information, that we’re putting the right information out, getting you, again, being able to explain what’s not true that you might hear, the politics of it, what it actually is and means, and how this works moving forward. So ACLJ, especially on the government affairs side, very active in this because a lot of the members of Congress, even though they’re there, they actually do lose a lot of their staff. So their staffs go to like a kind of a skeleton staff, if you will. So we can even assist more.
SPEAKER 12 :
All right. We’ll be right back. More on Sekulow. Welcome back to Sekulow. Phone lines are completely jammed right now. So if you want to call in, you’ve got to give it a second. Let other people get through. I’ll tell you when they open up. And if you’re watching online, you can obviously put your comments in as well. We have teams monitoring those comments. Some of those may make it on the air. We obviously have somebody reading them, and I try to read through a lot of them that comes in. I guess apparently right now there are some people in the chat that are… They’re angering some people. So if you’re watching right now and you’re on our team, maybe we need to go through and do a little cleaning on some of the bots that are in there or some people. Hey, throw in the chat right now to counter that. Tell me where you’re watching from right now. I really would appreciate that. I like looking at that because it’s not only here in this country. I always love to see there are people around the world that watch this show each and every day it’s really great you know american politics and american news uh is covered worldwide i think in a way that we cannot really fathom because the way the world events don’t get covered in america um if you go to europe you go to uh the uk uh there’s a good chance you turn on the news the face you’re seeing is president trump
SPEAKER 13 :
Yes, I mean, because we lead the world. Our economy leads the world. Our military protects the world. And look at just what we were talking about with Israel and the situation there, or even Ukraine and Russia and NATO. I mean, we matter most. That’s actually a good thing. I don’t mind that we matter most to the world. That means that we are still the leading power. If they were spending all their time on China, that would make me nervous. And that’s what we’re really looking at, right? I mean, that’s the only other country that could even come close, and it’s still not close when it comes to what we have inside our own country, what we’ve built, and also what we do around the world. And so let’s keep it that way. But yeah, don’t think… I mean, the whole world… pays attention to the United States. What you want is the correct messages out. You don’t want massive financial stock market crashes and things like that. Cover my shutdowns. Yes. I mean, for instance, I think this time around, if you’re, if you’re at work for like a TSA and how they pulled that in 2019, when they all called out sick to try and a lot of them did to, to try it because they’re supposed to show up because they’re going to get back pay. And so a bunch did, it slowed down a lot of flights, canceled a lot of flights and, They do that under President Trump. It feels like they’re doing that now every day. I feel like if they do that under President Trump, they’re not going to get their job back. Like they, I mean, they make it like he said, and they probably should get fired because you know, as a federal employee, Pete Hanks is going to take over the FAA in the New York. You’re covered here. You’re covered. You know, you’ve been through it before. And honestly, unlike most businesses who if had to close their doors, that’s it. There might not be any money there for the next week.
SPEAKER 12 :
We have a caller right now. We should let them speak. Susan in Pennsylvania who is a federal employee who is having this issue right now. It stinks for them. This is not fun. No one wants to trivialize that this is something that we should be laughing at. It shouldn’t be. Sadly, Susan, I look at the way they’re reacting and I wish they were reacting in the way that you are. Go ahead, Susan.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, hi. So I am a Department of War employee. I am currently furloughed as of midnight last night. I am a Trump supporter also. I just I don’t like the optics that’s being played. And I understand that’s politics. But you do have to understand that we do have that element now of reduction in force being thrown at us. And that is not a good place to be or a good feeling, especially when I’m a Trump supporter. And I want that. I want the corruption cleaned out, but, you know, there’s a lot of our lives being played with. And one more point. You say that, you know, we know we’ve been through this before. We know we’ll get paid. Well, we don’t know now that they’re talking reduction of force.
SPEAKER 13 :
Well, you’re saying, yes, if, for instance, they were to take action, say, hey, you know, there’s 23 percent. Everything was fine. Let’s not. Now, I think a lot of that’s talk. I feel for you, Susan, at the same time, I think we are at a point where the government’s too big. And I’m not saying it’s your job specifically, but the technology and the advances we’ve made, we can do a lot more with less people. And that doesn’t mean that you can’t take the skills and all the service that you’ve – as probably a great servant in the department for our country into the private sector. I know that’s not necessarily the most fun thing. But I do think you will get your back pay, and I think ultimately – If you are a Trump supporter, you get the idea, and you probably see it yourself in the department, that there’s plenty of people there who are sitting at desk, showing up maybe, maybe not even showing up, especially a lot of the side offices. We probably don’t need to be using taxpayer dollars to keep them employed if they’re not doing a service.
SPEAKER 12 :
And Susan, if for some reason… Give us insight into that. I don’t know where the ACLJ can come into that, but if for some reason that doesn’t happen, go to our website. Go to aclj.org slash help. You never know what we can do.
SPEAKER 13 :
There’s a law that says if you’re furloughed… Yeah, back pay. So I would imagine this, Susan. Worst case scenario, if all 23%, including Susan, were ultimately… part of the sizing back of government, which President Trump was very honest about when he ran and you voted for him, Susan, and said that we want to shrink the government, you would still get the back pay up until that point. So it’s not like you’re losing for today. You haven’t lost your job.
SPEAKER 12 :
All right. Thank you, Susan, for calling. Let’s take another call. Let’s go to Mary Ellen in Illinois. I’m going to open up a couple calls, a couple lines. Hopefully we can take some more in the next segment. Mary Ellen, go ahead.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yes, thank you. And following her call, I was just thinking as she was talking, you know, what about are all these jobs in the government, union jobs? So that’s one question. But I called in because President Trump has been saying that the Democrats, they won’t like things that may happen if it shuts down. And I was following this Russ Voigt from the Office of Management and Budget, or is it Budget and Management, which comes under the Executive Office? And it’s like they were talking about things like, well, you know, the question is, well, will they make more job cuts, you know, because like 100,000 had, I guess, resigned before this. What about cuttings? Are they able to cut agencies or make more doge cuts? So my question really is, do they have, you know, because if whatever President Trump will do or authorize, they’ll file a lawsuit. So the question is, Is this all, you know, what’s the legality of that, you know, going forward?
SPEAKER 13 :
Yeah, I mean, again, the legality of… I’m trying to make… I want to make it clear to everybody. The legality of the funding, I mean… This is not the executive branch, so I make that clear. The executive branch, ultimately, President Trump tries to get the deal done, but this is Congress, right? I mean, he can’t… He can just be kind of a middleman. He can sign it, but they gotta get it to his desk. And so… He has no issues. That’s why we have three equal branches of government. The continuing resolution that was put forward was not to cause a political fight. I want to make that clear. Republicans did not add in a bunch of additional new cuts or try to do something that would really change where the spinning was from the big, beautiful bill. and other legislations actually pass. All it would do is keep things the same.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, what they don’t want is, you know, they’re upset about the Doge cuts. They’re upset about the USAID cuts. They’re upset about all of those. They are certainly really upset. President Trump’s winning. Yeah, and one of, of course, the couple that are big ones are pro-life protections and, of course, the defunding of Planned Parenthood for the year. Those are the ones that, of course, they’re going to shut down the government over.
SPEAKER 13 :
Susan doesn’t get her paycheck this week at the Department of War because of their love of killing babies. Yeah.
SPEAKER 12 :
Seriously. Yeah, I mean, that is what it feels like. I mean, again, that’s what I’m saying. When you look at when they’re sitting there laughing, it doesn’t really necessarily feel that way that they’re taking it as seriously as people like Susan should. Mary Ellen, thank you for calling. We appreciate it. We are going to be taking more calls and comments in the next segment. So we have opened up a couple lines. 1-800-684-3110. 1-800-684-3110. 3-1-1-0. We got some calls also coming in about Israel. I want to give that a little bit more time. So if you’re calling in about that, we’ll give that in the next segment because we’ll need more time to talk about that. But once again, I wanted to tell you, you got to support the work of the ACLJ because we’re not going anywhere. We’re not shutting down. It’s October. We’re headed towards the end of the year now. I can’t believe we’re here, you know, where we live still pretty warm outside. So it hasn’t really turned to fall just yet. But the reckoning is coming, I guess, if you will, very soon. But with that, I know it’s very easy to get distracted with all that’s happening in the world. The ACLJ, whether it’s our media operation or legal operation, we are not funded primarily by major sponsors or corporations. We are supported by you, the individual. the person that gives on an individual level. Most of our donors give $75. Most of our donors don’t even give monthly. They just give one time a year. Now, we encourage you to give monthly, become what we call an ACLJ champion. That’s someone that gives an automatic renewing membership. We really appreciate all those people. It gives us a great baseline. Tens of thousands of you do it. It’s awesome. But again, they’re doing it at levels that start at $5. It’s not like we’re talking about an entry point that’s so high. We want you to be a part of the team because, like I said, when you hear our show, when you see our show, know that if you have an ad, yes, it’s on YouTube, a very small percentage of revenue comes to us from YouTube. Very small percentage of revenue comes from any sort of advertising. If you hear it on the radio, none of that goes to us. There are times in a lot of networks where we’re paying for that time. You may be going, Logan, why would you do that? You’re a broadcaster. Why are you paying to be on? Why are they not paying you? Because that company doesn’t get to decide what we can and can’t say. And that is not true for most of the world of news media, of entertainment media, of political media, of religious broadcasting. If you’re being told by a network, look what happened recently. Look what’s going on in the news, even on the other side, even the Jimmy Kimmel’s and the Stephen Colbert’s. Eventually someone could do that, but they can’t do that to us. And that’s because people like you decide you’re going to support this broadcast. You decide you’re going to support also the organization or all of our legal work. And today’s October 1st. Let’s kick it off strong. I’m going to encourage you to go to ACLJ.org as we head into this last segment of the show today where we get to hear from all of you. And right now we have one line open. So we’re going to do our best to get to as many calls as we can. But think about it, pray about it, support the work at ACLJ.org. We’ll be right back. Welcome back to Seculo. Phone lines, two are open. And this would be your last chance to possibly make it on the air today. 1-800-684-3110. Give us a call. Let’s kick it off. Let’s go. This one’s about Israel, and I think it’s okay to divert a little bit to that. Let’s go to Don in California, who’s listening on the radio. Don, go ahead.
SPEAKER 01 :
Oh, hi, fellas. Blessed, high holy days. You know, I’m really upset when I hear these foreign leaders recognizing a Palestinian state. They’re going to pick a little country like Israel, carve out the heart of biblical Israel, and give that to a people that want to kill them. I said, wait a minute. Australia has a lot of space. You could create a nice Palestinian back canada has a lot of space you could plant a you know a palestinian state in in the yukon you know it’s like it’s always and it’s the brits and the french are the worst offenders of carving up the middle east and creating the doggone problem so uh i’m at my wit’s end what do you think fellas well don i mean if you look at history the arab countries did step up and you know what the the palestinians who were welcomed into uh jordan by the country you know what they did they tried to kill the king
SPEAKER 13 :
They did. And and they were. So instead of saying thank you for because they’re this one, that’s the closest related country to Palestinians, Jordanians, trans Jordan, that area. And so they’re welcomed in there. You know, the language is the same job services and they ultimately get pushed out because they tried to kill the people that help them.
SPEAKER 12 :
Last night, Don, I was at the premiere of House of David season two, which is coming to Amazon. And the first episode of season two is just a war. It’s just a fight scene for 45 minutes following the events of David killing Goliath. And the whole time you’re sitting there and as they’re fighting for Israel and control of Israel and the king of Israel and all of these things, you just go, not only have we been doing this for thousands of years. I mean, they even say in this, we’ll be talking about this war for the rest of eternity. And it does feel that same way. I mean, yes, obviously that is a scripted moment, but definitely was a wink and a nod to even what’s going on right now. that these wars are everlasting and have been something that has been going on really since the dawn of time, unfortunately. I do want to thank them for inviting us out there. It was interesting to watch. I believe season two starts later in the week, so I’ll just give them a nice plug there for House of David. It does give you a bit. More of a visual understanding of what’s going on there. But yeah, Don, hopefully we’ll have an answer from Hamas. Now, what Hamas is, who Hamas is, I think is interesting right now, as we’ve said, because it’s not necessarily the same leadership as most of them have been taken out. So what that looks like, the official response now, they have indicated that they are thinking positively. There are things like the Tony Blair situation they’re not as thrilled about, but you know, As you said, the pressure’s on. So we’ll see where that goes. Let’s hit some more phone calls. You can give us a call. Last chance. This will be really your last chance. 1-800-684-3110. Tony’s calling in Colorado and watching on ACLJ.org. Great place to watch. You can obviously catch up with all the great information. None of it ever behind a paywall on ACLJ.org. Very proud of that. That’s because people like you support the work. Tony, go ahead.
SPEAKER 07 :
Hi. I’m just curious. I don’t know how all the politicians are paid or such. I’m really not in. in the knowledge of any of that. But if we were to miss a deadline at work for some reason, there would be a penalty. What penalties do they get for not hitting deadlines, for not doing the job that they were, I guess, voted in to do? Yeah, do their paychecks keep going?
SPEAKER 12 :
Those who vote, when they’ve voted for a shutdown, do the politicians still get paid? Yeah.
SPEAKER 13 :
Members of Congress still get paid because the Constitution says they have to. Their staff doesn’t though. So, they do have an incentive to, and some of their staff they will, they consider essential and they have to work without pay. They also will get the back pay. And then some of the staff is considered non-essential. And the reason why they do that is because when there is no trash services and food services, things like that, you don’t want a full office necessarily. And because things, it does get kind of gross real fast. And also… It’s just kind of not right. So the idea is that, you know, you might keep the core, but they’re working without pay. So even though, and a lot of the members of Congress have said, you know, if this goes on to that point, a day shutdown is not really impacting this yet. They won’t take the paycheck.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, it looks like at least, like you said, that it likely will last at least through tomorrow at this point.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yes, and then you’ve got, they usually don’t, it’ll be interesting to see if they do like maybe another morning vote tomorrow. Because then they usually go home for Yom Kippur. So it’s an earlier leave, and then they would come back. I mean, technically, if it wasn’t for that, they’d be working it through the weekend. So there might be a 24 hours where there isn’t a vote. That ultimately will be up to leadership.
SPEAKER 12 :
All right, Tony, thanks for calling. Let’s continue on with a couple more calls. Let’s go to Sean, who’s calling in Oklahoma on line three. Sean, go ahead.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes, sir. Hello. My name is Sean in Oklahoma City, as you said, and I’m a moderate conservative Christian and a constitutionalist. I’d like to get your input on this. Our U.S. Constitution, I believe, needs to be amended, and we should add a line item veto. Line item veto is when instead of credit laws being passed with good laws, they bundle all the laws for one vote. And I’d like that to stop. So each one law can be voted individually instead of all of the above. I think that would make voting easier for their politicians. Interesting concept, Sean.
SPEAKER 13 :
The politicians could vote that way. But when you’re talking about funding the entire federal government, it’s pretty tough to do that. It’s not like just six pieces of legislation.
SPEAKER 12 :
It’s also these standards of how to get things through. It is political, political, as political as ever been.
SPEAKER 13 :
When you’re talking line item veto, I want to explain to people what most people think when they hear line item veto, if they understand the idea of it. Some states allow it. Some governors have that power. If the legislation passes and it goes to the president’s desk… they can cut pieces out that they believe are… Yeah, so you could say, we’re not funding Planned Parenthood. Right. But we are going to pass the rest of this. That’s not allowed currently. So the idea is… And I’m not sure, again, the idea kind of I love… When you love the president and you support their policies, do you love it when it’s not a president? You may not be able to get anything done. Right. Or you fought hard in Congress to take back control. You put it on their desk three or four times. They can veto the whole thing if they want. So the president still has the power to say no to this continuing resolution. But he supports, obviously, the Republican continuing resolution. So he’ll sign it the moment it gets to his desk.
SPEAKER 12 :
Hey, I don’t think, Brock, we’ll be able to get to you today. Call back earlier tomorrow. Your topic is very broad. Tariffs keep getting collected, by the way. He’s asking about tariffs.
SPEAKER 13 :
Yes, they will still be collected because the government is still functioning. As we said, 73% of federal employees are working. Okay, so again…
SPEAKER 12 :
If you’re one of the people who called in who has been currently furloughed, now that we understand that this is a stressful and painful time, but also we’ve got to make sure that you know the facts, and that’s why hopefully you’ve enjoyed this last hour. We’ve been able to really give you a lot of great information. Send this show to your friends. You can literally copy and paste this YouTube link. Send in your text threads with all of your political buddies and go, here’s what you can learn.
SPEAKER 13 :
The one part that I think is never cool with shutdowns is the military and people who do security and federal work, law enforcement. Because they have to still go out and risk their lives. They will get their back pay, too. But that’s what I think. But I mean, they’re the ones really putting their lives on the line. So it’s more than just financial issues for them. And they’re still doing that. And I feel like if we could amend another law like the way they have amended for some other people, that would be where to start.
SPEAKER 12 :
All right, thanks for watching today. We really appreciate it. A lot of you are brand new. If you’re brand new and you’ve never been a part of this show before, you’re watching maybe on YouTube, hit that subscribe button right now. It’s a great free way to support this show, but also you get your feed hopefully every day, 12 to 1 p.m. Eastern, clipped out, and there’s podcast versions you can watch later on, however you can. Of course, support the work financially if you can as well, especially if you’ve been watching for a while at aclj.org. Talk to you tomorrow.
