In another segment, we turn our attention to Columbia University’s monumental settlement following investigations into systemic anti-Semitism on campus. Jeff Balaban from ACLJ Jerusalem joins in to provide insight into why this settlement is a significant step towards justice for Jewish students across the nation. We also highlight the recent developments in Judea and Samaria, as the Knesset extends its sovereignty over these historic lands. For 35 years, ACLJ has been at the forefront of such crucial conversations, and this episode emphasizes the ongoing need for support to continue fighting for justice both at home and globally.
SPEAKER 07 :
We’ve got breaking news. The DOJ assembles a strike force over the Russiagate intelligence.
SPEAKER 10 :
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 07 :
Welcome to Sekulow. Will Haines in studio. This is Logan Sekulow. We also have my dad, Jay Sekulow, joining us in the next segment. And towards the end of the broadcast, Jeff Balaban from ACLJ Jerusalem is going to be joining us as the Justice Department announced this morning the formation of a strike force. that will be assessing all of the evidence that was publicized by Tulsi Gabbard from the ODNI. So that is the breaking news that’s coming out of there. If you want to know what a strike force is, well, my dad was part of one, so you’re going to hear that coming up. I also just have to take a second here. You hear kind of a somber tone in our voices. there’s been breaking news and look, it’s been a rough week. Uh, I feel like for pop culture. And of course we talked earlier about the passing of Ozzy Osbourne. Now when the hits a little closer to home, even for a lot of us, Americans, real Americans, and that is the passing of Hulk Hogan, Terry Bollea, who passed away at the age of 71 this morning in his house in Tampa, Florida. Uh, I got to spend some time with Hogan over the years. It was always kind to me. He, you remember him last year doing the RNC, being very involved in what was going on. Of course, pro wrestlers live very intense lives as someone who’s been involved in that industry as well. Uh, our prayers to his family and to his friends, including some of our close friends, like the Bischoff family. Uh, and of course to, uh, Hogan’s family as well. And, uh, you know, Hulk mania will run forever. We’ll live forever. So, uh, that is something that we will celebrate. But of course, right now, just a tragic news about Hulk Hogan. We’re not going to spend the whole show talking about that as much as I would like to. Um, because you know we had a whole show prepped but you know sometimes the mood changes here and uh you know let’s let’s just be honest sometimes that’s not a fun uh not a fun way to start but let’s kick this off well i do want to go because my dad’s gonna be joining us in the next segment about what this looks like when you’re a part of a strike force so give us an update of what happened
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right. So the Office of the Attorney General and the Department of Justice put out an actual press release about this. So this isn’t just reported anonymous sources, anything like that, that they have formed a strike force to assess evidence publicized by the ODNI, Office of Director of National Intelligence. And there’s this quote from Attorney General Pam Bondi that says the Department of Justice is proud to work with my friend, Director Gabbard, and we are grateful for her partnership in delivering accountability for the American people. We will investigate these troubling disclosures fully and leave no stone unturned to deliver justice. So strike force may be a term you’re not familiar with or you haven’t heard before. We’re going to get into all that and what kind of the limitations or what they can do, how that organization is formed within the Department of Justice in the next segment with your dad. As you mentioned, he had served on one before, but really it shows that strike forces this morning.
SPEAKER 07 :
I go, there rings a bell. I feel like we had something to do with the strike force. So I texted my dad. I was like,
SPEAKER 11 :
ever involved in a strike force and he was like oh yeah i was like well then you need to hop on right you need to hop on and talk about this because you know you get some insider perspective so he’s going to be joining us uh in the next segment but i think it also shows that they are taking it seriously this isn’t just relegated to one u.s attorney somewhere that has an entire caseload that’s looking into things this will be the focus of a group of DOJ officials and attorneys looking into these allegations and this documentation and disclosures that Director Gabbard has made. We’re also going to get into, Logan, that very intense press briefing that we saw yesterday where she was at the podium in the White House. Director Gabbard was laying out a lot of this to the press corps.
SPEAKER 07 :
Well, it certainly ramps up. You were going for, I think, some of the calls that came in yesterday. Maybe that was the day before yesterday. A couple of them were like, do you think anything is going to happen? And I said yesterday that I really wasn’t sure. You get these feelings with politics. There’s people like Tulsi Gabbard who are going to expose everything. Then who knows about the people who actually can do the job and get it done. Fortunately, it seems like it’s moving much quicker this time. And they’re actually taking it seriously by putting together this strike force. So I find that to be very interesting and a good development for the American people. Phone lines are open for you as we head into the final week of our 35 years of Justice Drive. And we need your support right now. All donations are matched. So do it right now. Scan the QR code, give $10, becomes $20, so on and so on. Have your gifts doubled. You can join in the fight and make the difference today. Take action before it’s too late. Again, only a few weeks or a few days left in our 35 years of justice drive. My dad, Jay Sekulow, joining us, coming up. Welcome back to Sekulow. A lot of you are just joining us right now. So if you are just joining us, I’m going to restate what’s going on. My dad, Jay Sekulow, is joining us via phone right now to talk about what it’s like to be part of one of these strike forces. Will, we can give a little update on what that is for those who are just joining us right now. Of course, we are. covering the breaking news. Again, if you’re a pop culture fan, if you’re a fan of professional wrestling, if you’re a fan of Americana, the passing of really the greatest of all time, the original big giant star in professional wrestling, Hulk Hogan, passed away at the age of 71. Someone who, again, got to meet, spend a little time with. Dad, you as well. And of course, his really close friends and family, including the Bischoffs, who have been friends of ours for years, so our prayers are to them. But Will… Let’s go over what happened with Tulsi Gabbard. She releases these documents. Now, Pam Bondi and the team are responding.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right. The DOJ put out a press release announcing the formation of a strike force to assess evidence publicized by the ODNI. And they say that they are going to investigate potential next legal steps, which might stem from D&I Gabbard’s disclosures. For many people, this term strike force is something new, something that you don’t hear about that often. But that’s one of the reasons why we wanted to have your dad on because he has direct experience with strike forces in the DOJ and what that means, what they’re capable of. So I want to go right to you. What is this strike force that is being assembled within the DOJ?
SPEAKER 09 :
So first of all, let me tell you what it’s not. It’s not a special counsel. It’s not a group of lawyers that the Department of Justice sequesters into their own area and their reporting is different. This is within the Justice Department. And strike forces and task force are used by the Department of Justice when there has been credible evidence of wrongdoing at a nature and scope But the Attorney General determines there needs to be a dedicated team. It could be multiple offices. It will be. It could be multiple agencies. It’ll be in cooperation as Pam Bondi has said and as Tulsi has said. Pam and Tulsi have both said that they will be working together. So it’ll be a multi-governmental agency group. multi attorneys within the Department of Justice. They do sometimes bring in outside lawyers. I worked on after 9-11, some of the legal work that needed to take place for information sharing and information gathering to prevent the terrorist attacks. And we had a special task force, strike force set up for that. It was done to get legislation through. So these entities under the authority of the attorney general are dedicated to to this one specific task. And this is a big task because the weaponization of the Department of Justice, and I’ve been saying the Brennan, Clapper, Comey issues have been real for a long time. I think we need to know exactly what happened, and this will do that. But it’s an interagency. Sometimes outside lawyers come in and consult. uh with the department of justice i actually after logan you you called me on it i uh and asked about it i i remember also i was on one for uh john ashcroft in a separate matter and that was we had a task force set up uh to go after child sex trafficking and pornography and i mean i it went to the point where i actually went to uh the united states attorney general’s training center at the university of south carolina And lectured to U.S. attorneys from all over the country, actually U.S. attorneys that were stationed all over the world on the sex trafficking and the issue of child pornography and child obscenity. So these are not unusual, but they’re very dedicated and very specific in their orientation and to what the goal is.
SPEAKER 11 :
And when you look at the fact that the DOJ is taking these steps, it’s not just being assigned to one U.S. attorney’s office to look at and see if there’s anything there. It shows there is positive movement for those of us that want to see accountability, that want to see some sort of real justice from what was perpetrated on this country almost how many years ago? Eight years ago now, almost 10 years ago in some cases. But when you have to look at this and also, think that there are limitations with what we’ve talked about on the show. President Obama obviously is being brought up a lot with this. There is a recent immunity ruling, but this does bring up that there could be real accountability for these individuals that were perpetrating this against the United States. But I want to get your take on what some realistic expectations of an outcome, not prejudging the
SPEAKER 09 :
teams work but what we could be looking at from the doj was something like this well there’s two things that we need to know from the outset number one and this is important to understand rather than having a u.s attorney’s office deal with this where they have 50 you know 60 150 200 other cases these are lawyers that will be handpicked within the department of justice to focus on this activity they are it is the department of justice so they have full satina power indictments All of that can happen. Now, I want to say something about the president’s situation as it relates to President Obama. Remember, it was President Trump. We were involved in it. We went to the Supreme Court of the United States to argue immunity for presidents when they’re involving official acts. And the court ruled totally in our favor. And so I think tagging President Obama on this is going to be very difficult.
SPEAKER 07 :
One of the questions that a lot of people seem to have is you put Barack Obama on this, you start using words like treason, you start using these kind of phrases, and you start thinking, okay, are they reaching too far? Now, yesterday when some people called in, I said, yeah, I don’t think anything’s going to happen. You’re presidential immunity now. I don’t think also you’re going to have anything happen to President Obama. It feels like a kind of… Maybe he’s a fringe character in this, but could be. But now they’re putting together this strike force. It certainly seems like they’re taking it a step further and much quicker than I anticipated.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yes. And you’re exactly correct, Logan. And that is the strike force is dedicated to finding justice, which means they will subpoena. They will review documents. jury dedicated to this. They can do that as well. So this is very, when they say strike force, think about it in the context of military. It’s an operation dedicated to one task. Taking President Obama out of it, because that raises a whole host of constitutional issues that affect the presidency. But the others, Brennan, Clapper, others, they don’t have that immunity. So if there is culpability and criminal liability, they can be held accountable for what has happened. It will not just be a special counsel report. They can take direct action here.
SPEAKER 07 :
All right. Well, look, this is also an important time with the ACLJ because we are celebrating 35 years of justice, and we’re in the final week of that match right now, Dad. I want to give you an opportunity. We still have a few minutes here in this segment, but I want to give you the opportunity to talk about this kind of work when it comes up. The ACLJ can get involved in many different ways, and we do, and that’s why it’s important to have a team of experts and a media team doing this. We see a lot of coverage right now, people talking about NPR and PBS and a lot of people saying, how dare they be defunded? And I’ve kind of told them, you know, I’m a fan of a lot of the programming that comes there. So you don’t put your money where your mouth is. Why does the government have to be the one funding the media? But what we’re able to do here is create completely independent media, create a completely independent legal work. Thanks to our ACLJ supporters and monthly champions.
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, first of all, you guys are doing a great job on this and on the media and the legal work, as you know, and you cover it every day is going forward. But I do want to say, first of all, thank you to our ACLJ members and champions around the country that have been supporting the work of the ACLJ. But let me say this. This is a critically important time. A lot of new initiatives are being developed right now. The work is taking place literally around the globe. In ways we could have never imagined, we’re seeing excellent results. We’re getting great victories. But that doesn’t happen without the support of our listeners and our champions and our ACLJ members. I want to encourage you. to support the work of the ACLJ. We’re in the matching challenge. This is a huge month for us, and we’re within like 2% of getting to where we need to be. So if everyone would contribute, it will make a huge difference. And if you can do it monthly, you become an ACLJ champion. There’s thousands and thousands of ACLJ champions. What a difference it makes for our ability to plan and adjust and take on new projects and new cases. And as you said, Logan, and you say it often, we don’t put our media behind a paywall. We don’t put our articles and films behind paywalls. We get the information, the documentaries, the shorts. Those are all out there for people to consume and to understand. We want to maintain that type of approach. So support the work of the ACLJ today.
SPEAKER 07 :
To consume, to share, to have something you can share with your friends that you don’t have to sneak them your login to another sort of outlet that may put everything behind a paywall. I don’t know if Will gift me an article because I’m not paying for the New York Times. It’s just not the case here with the ACLJ. It’s not the way we’ve want to run and it’s not the way we have run for decades. We want to continue doing that. Look, a little peek behind the curtain, as my dad just said, we’re a couple percent down. Understand that’s a huge success right now that we are in a an interesting time economically coming out of, of course, four years of kind of economic chaos. But we are seeing the tide turn. And that is great for the organization. That is great for our media team. That is great for our legal team, because we can’t do without you. And look, we have analysis every month. We’ve got to go through and go, OK, what are we doing? Is there something we need to do? to spend time on when you donate during a certain time it’s also saying this is important to me and right now during this final week of our 35 years of justice drive we urgently need your support help will and i even if you’re doing that you know because we’re over here leading this broadcast help will and i take it over the top today As we take it over the top, then we get a lot of nice emails, Will, instead of the sad ones saying you guys didn’t do a good job today. We’ll get the good emails that say, good job, boys. Or usually, actually, they’re just kind of quiet, but we’ll at least send them to ourselves. Exactly. Give right now if you can. Scan the QR code that’s on the screen. I’m seeing a lot of comments come in who are just joining us. Of course, our prayers are to the Bollea family, Hulk Hogan, just absolute legend for American pop culture and professional wrestling, as you know, that I’m a huge fan of. Man, it’s a tough one. It’s a tough one to imagine you’re living in an America without Hulk Hogan, but it is what it is. We’ll be back in just a moment with more on Sekulow. Welcome back to Secular. We are going to be taking more calls and comments coming up in the next half hour. So 1-800-684-3110 if you want to be on the air. My dad, Jay Secular, was just on the broadcast in the last segment. If you want to know more about kind of the foundation of a strike force, what that looks like, I encourage you later on, after the show is over, not right now, to go back and listen to that segment because I think you’ll find it pretty informative and a point of view that not a lot of people can get when you have, again, someone who is directly involved in that way. Now, we did want to also talk about Tulsi Gabbard’s sort of A fiery, I guess you’d say, press conference. My son and my wife and I were watching it and it was a pretty wild moment. Now, what it really exposed, what it really exposed was that, again, not unlike when President Biden was physically not up to task and they told us that he was. And they’re lying to you. What it really exposed is that these conversations were happening even for Hillary Clinton. And when we would bring it up or other people would bring it up, you would not only be mocked, we would never bring it up on the air. Because one, I think there is going a little low and going after somebody’s medical history or whatever it is when it’s rumors. But they clearly were hiding information. And that’s what Tulsi said. Of course, Tulsi maybe does have a chip on her shoulder. Obviously, Hillary Clinton was the person that planted that seed that was Tulsi Gabbard is a Russian asset and shouldn’t be trusted. That, of course, was in the time when Tulsi Gabbard was running for president of the United States against a whole litany of people as she was running against President Trump as well.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, also maybe don’t put someone on a no-fly list that’s a decorated veteran intelligence officer served as a congresswoman from Hawaii. Maybe Intel Community and Department of Homeland Security, when you put someone like that on a no-fly list, they’re going to find all your secrets that you’re hiding once they are as a director of national intelligence. She tells you to put her on a nuts and quiet list.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah. The loud list.
SPEAKER 11 :
Right. But here’s the other issue, Logan. And we talked last segment about not being behind a paywall and not. We want to get truth out. We want to get information out. That’s a big part of what the ACLJ does, whether it’s through the courts or through this broadcast. But. Many of these agencies, news agencies, news organizations, don’t want you to know the truth. They want to protect you from the truth as they see it. Now, let’s go ahead and play. This is how CNN was covering the daily press briefing from the White House, where it was a big surprise moment. The director of national intelligence was speaking from the podium. That’s normally a let’s tune into this. But as soon as she started, you know, maybe throwing some things out there, reading from the intelligence they’ve given to the Department of Justice, which implicated some of CNN’s favorite people. I mean, some of them, I think, have been employed by CNN as commentators. So here’s how they decided to handle when she got to the podium. Let’s run bite six. And if you’re watching, you’ll be able to really see the full measure of them trying to protect the people from the truth.
SPEAKER 02 :
multiple intelligence community assessments released in the months leading up to the November 2016 election concluded that Russia had neither the intent nor capability to impact the outcome of the US election. On December 5th.
SPEAKER 06 :
We’ve been listening there to the director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, continuing on what has now been a multi-day effort, not only with public statements like this, but release of documents to attempt to back up the quite extreme allegation that President Obama is guilty of treason and that he worked in some sort of…
SPEAKER 07 :
That is CNN deciding, you know what, we don’t like what she’s saying. And look, we’ve seen this multiple times with a lot of networks, including, you remember, George Stephanopoulos, my dad was speaking, doing the famous kill sign to get off of him. Because when they don’t like what’s being said… It’s not for you to decide whether you agree with them or disagree with them. It’s for them to decide. And they won’t even give Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, give her a few minutes to speak what she is saying. To not only put out all these documents, but then go, here’s the real answer. President Obama wants to respond. Well, here’s my response to that.
SPEAKER 11 :
And it went on. It was a wonderful press brief briefing, actually. You were talking about how, even in those interviews with Tulsi, how she remains so measured and so calm. But you know, one, everything that these deep state actors put her through, but now she has all this evidence that she’s laying out. How the President of the United States was directing this with that briefing and that meeting of principles that he had in December after President Trump was elected, but before the inauguration, how they changed the narrative. And even in that issue that we talked about, they talked about how there was intel on the health, on the condition of Hillary Clinton that they were covering up for. They were hiding. The Russians knew many things that they were holding to try and weaken Hillary Clinton after they assumed she was going to win. Now, if you were to be an evil overlord of an adversarial country, And you have compromising material on Hillary Clinton, or on one of the candidates. You would probably want that candidate to win so that you could leverage that going forward. That is what kind of the Intel assessment was. They were trying to wreak havoc on the elections. They were trying to make America look weak and look unorganized and a weak democracy. And then when Hillary won, they also had something on her they could use later. That was the Intel assessment. They almost copied and pasted with a little bit of change when they decided to fabricate intelligence and come up with things and use other things that weren’t ready for publication because they weren’t assessed to be valid or they didn’t meet analytical standards. And so they’re like, oh, they assumed Hillary would win and then they’d have leverage over her. Let’s just flip the narrative and say… basically the the skeleton of the story but let’s just change hillary to trump that is literally what they were doing they completely shifted what the intel community had been saying was the truth so that they could undermine the incoming president of the united states that’s right and look i want to take a quick call before we head into the second half hour of secular we’ll take just as many let’s go to gene who is calling in illinois of course this is a question that a lot of people have in terms of what immunity actually looks like go ahead
SPEAKER 03 :
Hi, thank you. I was under the impression that the immunity ruling was only for official acts. So if Obama was coordinating or in charge of this possible conspiracy, wouldn’t he be at risk?
SPEAKER 11 :
So, Jean, that’s where it will get interesting to see. I mean, even if the Department of Justice attempts to go that direction, because the yes, you are correct. That is for official acts. You cannot be prosecuted. What that gave President Trump immunity from was what the Department of Justice was trying to prosecute him for. Things like when he called the elections board in Georgia and the governor and were saying things like, look for more votes. Now, obviously there’s different ways you can take that, but they were trying to say that was him improperly influencing using his presidency that was an abuse of power. What the Supreme Court ruling was helpful for the defense of President Trump was that a president calling a state and saying, make sure the elections on the up and up is an official act. President Obama calling together Intel directors and saying, let’s look at this Intel. Let’s see if there’s a better way forward. Having a principals meeting, those are official acts, even though it looks like there was a conspiracy to undermine. So it will the evidence would have to be so strong that it was not just him calling the meeting and giving this opportunity to change it for them to really to be able to pursue it. But I still think there’s a strong defense of he was a president calling an intel meeting.
SPEAKER 07 :
Absolutely. We got a second half hour coming up. I want you to join us live. So join us right now on ACLJ.org, Facebook, YouTube, Rumble. We’re broadcasting live. Of course, later on, if you’re listening to this pre-recorded later on in the day, a lot of you do, millions of you do. Just stay tuned. We got another half hour coming up. Jeff Balaban from ACLJ Jerusalem is going to be joining us and we got a lot more to cover. Phone lines are open again for you at 1-800-684-3110. Help take us over the top today. Give a donation if you can and have it doubled.
SPEAKER 10 :
keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever. This is Sekulow. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 07 :
Phone lines are open for you. Will Haynes is joining me in studio. My dad, Jay Sekulow, was on earlier in the show. If you haven’t gone back, I encourage you, once this show is over, to go back and listen to that. Really giving a great perspective on what it looks like to be a part of one of these strike forces that was announced today by Pam Bondi after a recommendation with all of those documents that were dropped from DNI Tulsi Gabbard. We’re going to break that all down. Still going. keep you updated on that. And phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. 1-800-684-3110. I’d love for you to call in today with your thoughts and comments. Of course, we are also talking about the breaking news. I know it’s totally off topic, but you know, I’m a big professional wrestling fan. You know, I’m a big pop culture fan and look, I’m seeing all the news is covering it right now. And that is the passing. of an American icon, really. Hulk Hogan, Terry Bollea, Hollywood Hogan. You may be known from the Rocky movies. Was involved in so much in American pop culture, including the presidential election of President Trump just this past year, appearing at the RNC. And again, someone who has… Again, when you’re a professional wrestler, you’re living an interesting life. But someone that, especially if you grew up in the 80s and 90s, when he was still a good guy before he turned heel, was obviously always promoting to say your prayers and take your vitamins. And again, just a classic American icon. He’ll be missed by all of us, again, as professional wrestling fans, but even just as fans of the United States of America. He was a patriotic force. That being said, we are going to get back to the news. Of course, the news is that Tulsi Gabbard obviously releases all these documents. It’s a pretty fiery intel briefing or press briefing. That then leads today, and I think this is a good move because it shows they mean business. It leads today to a big decision to put together the strike force.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s right. And once again, I think we should take this call really quick. Bobby calling from New York because I think there’s an interesting thing to lay out as well with this. So, Bobby, you’re on the air. Welcome to Sekulow.
SPEAKER 12 :
Hi, Logan. Hi, Will. Hey, Logan, you better be careful the strike force doesn’t come after you. But what I’m mad about is there was a political commentator on our side saying that Cash Mattel, as the FBI director, isn’t doing anything, and that he even looks frightened on camera. And I want to know, what’s that all about, or how did that all get started? Maybe you can comment on it.
SPEAKER 07 :
What did I do to this strike force? I don’t know. That felt like a threat.
SPEAKER 11 :
No, it’s all good. Yeah, I don’t know. Watch out. To your point, Bobby, though, yes. And there’s people in the conservative sphere that are going after people like Kash Patel, Dan Bongino, saying they’re not doing enough. What they’re doing is doing things the right way. And unfortunately, that takes some time. Yeah, people don’t like that. Because I want to go through this. Here’s what happens when you do it the wrong way. You fabricate intelligence to try and undercut a presidency. Then you send spies into the White House to try and entrap people of a newly elected president. And then you get FISA warrants based off bad intelligence to spy on American citizens that worked for that president. Then when the president tries to fix that and fires the FBI director for things that are criminal, then you get a special counsel slapped on you so you can’t do anything because your attorney general is recused. So the deep state strengthens themselves and huddles around and they waste millions and millions of dollars on a phony investigation for years. We know all about that. We had to live through it. And then all that goes away. Then they try to impeach him. So people say, well, oh, why didn’t these people do it during the first administration or why aren’t they doing it fast enough? The first administration being able to go after any of this wasn’t even on the table because there was a special counsel in place for the majority of it. And then you get out, and then there’s a global pandemic where China may or may not have had a lab leak that crippled the entire world. So, yeah, a lot couldn’t happen. But now the right people are in, and they’re doing it the right way. You know what they’re not doing? Fabricating intelligence. They’re releasing the intelligence. They’re setting up a strike force to investigate it. They’re doing it the right way.
SPEAKER 07 :
You got it. at least give it up to them there’s campaign promises and a lot of them have been met with the all the documents that have been released to either the general public or you know in general just have been dropped whether that’s from the jfk files the martin luther king files this tulsi gabbard is doing what she said she was going to do So you got to give it up to her for that. Coming up next, we’re going to be joined by Jeff Balaban, head of ACLJ Jerusalem. And again, after that, we’re going to take your calls and comments. That’s at 1-800-684-3110. Give if you can during this 35 years of Justice Drive. And be quiet for five seconds while you scan that QR code. Be right back. Welcome back, Secula. We’re now joined by Jeff Balaban, head of ACLJ Jerusalem. Jeff, one of the things we’ve got to start with is sort of this news that came out that Columbia University has settled with the Trump administration. There’s been a lot of conversation about settling with the Trump administration, and now we have this where… upwards of 200 million dollars they have settled over the anti-semitism claims saying they were not protecting their jewish students enough now of course they don’t only have to put their money where their mouth is they have to actually do something about it but this is a very interesting move from uh what you would say is the elite institutions in this country that seem to be harboring this kind of conversation
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, let me start, first of all, giving credit to the fact that none of this would have come to light until the GOP took the House and held public hearings. And all of a sudden, it was exposed to everybody, the incredible systemic, systematic anti-Semitism at these elite institutions going all the way to the top. and then also let’s not forget that it was president trump who finally elevated it to a national issue that demanded consequences so kudos this is very very important because the situation it’s really should be unimaginable this is happening in the united states of america at educational institutions That said, you know, like everything else, this is very controversial. There are people who are criticizing the deal, there are people supporting the deal. Some are saying, you know, that it’s the first time a university has been forced to pay any price at all for failing to protect Jewish students, which is a precedent, that it’s going to mandate real changes, including adopting the federal definition of anti-Semitism, known as the IRA definition, which is a good, solid definition, and reviewing DEI, and it sends a message nationwide. You’re being watched and there’ll be consequences. Others say, Honestly, Colombia’s got a $15 billion endowment, $220 million doesn’t seem like very much. No one was fired. Let’s put it this way. This is a very, very important watershed moment. And thanks is absolutely due to the administration for really pushing hard on this. And obviously, we have to watch and make sure that Colombia and other institutions take it seriously and do change their ways.
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, and Jeff, I want to kind of piggyback off that is that one, it wouldn’t have happened if, like you said, this wasn’t exposed because we knew that there were these bad protests or encampments or terror rallies, whatever you want to call them. I mean, it was horrific what we saw. But it was really the Republicans in the House and people like Elise Stefanik who really took the presidents of the universities and exposed how bad the rot was at these universities. When the president of Harvard was trying to say that calls for genocide could be situationally okay, I mean, is what she was basically saying. It depends on the context of how they’re saying, you know, that all Jews should die. You know, it’s context. when you take that and think okay we are starting to see movement while there can be and probably rightly so in many circles criticism of this i think it is also incumbent upon the the department of education the trump administration to ensure that there is real change they can’t just say we got a settlement it’s publicized now we can just go about our business that there needs to be real teeth to this that they have to know they are being watched and they can’t get away with this again or else next time it won’t be a 200 million dollar settlement with your 15 billion dollar endowment just being barely touched by this
SPEAKER 05 :
I agree. And I also believe that the president himself, from the very top, does care about this issue. He knows it’s grossly immoral and it’s part of the fabric of destroying the fabric of America. And I’m saying it’s part of the academic fabric happening in universities. And so I think he does care about this. I think the people around him care about this. And so whether you think this was—not you personally, but whether people think this was enough— or not enough. It’s a very important first step. I think it’s very encouraging. And I’m glad that we will continue to work with the administration, with Congress, et cetera. I will just tell you, we haven’t discussed it yet, but literally an hour or two ago, I was talking with a student at a well-known university, not Columbia as it happens, who was talking about an incident where a professor literally put the professor’s hand, you know, shot their arm in the sky and said, Heil Hitler, to make a point. And no one was clear what the point was. This is insanity. It’s got to stop.
SPEAKER 11 :
I can figure out what the point is. Yeah, I think the point is pretty clear. No one knew I know what that point is, right? Yeah, yeah. But Jeff, I also want to talk about another issue because we will be… I want to get to this other issue because this is something we’ve worked on. You’ve worked on with ACLJ Jerusalem. We’ve represented members from Judea and Samaria. And when you look at this… what the lawmakers in the Knesset have done. I want you to give a little bit of background and talk about some of the work ACLJ Jerusalem does for these areas. And one, also, why we don’t refer to these areas as the West Bank, as the world likes to. But give us a little bit of background, some of the work ACLJ has done on this as well.
SPEAKER 05 :
Sure. So we have, on and off, depending on situations, represented, for example, the Judean Samaria Council, which is a council that has dozens of regional and municipalities that all have elected officials. And so even though it’s not like there’s a federal government, there are local governments in Israel besides the national government. And there are towns and cities in what the world likes to call the West Bank. Now, the word West, the words West Bank was… sort of a mendacious title that they use to try to suggest that this doesn’t belong to the jews it’s not part of the you know the jewish national home it’s literally judea and samaria jews the name comes from judea and instead it’s the west bank of the jordan river trying to connect it to the state of jordan which was of course a fictitious creation in the 19 you know the 1900s but also built on land much of which is biblically belongs to the Jewish people. So today, a small part of that, not the part that’s Jordan, just the part that’s Judea and Samaria, and we don’t like using the words West Bank because that, again, it denies thousands of years of history, of biblical history, of Jewish history, of world history, of Christian history. This is Judea and Samaria. And so… We prefer to use those terms. The rest of the world likes to use the words West Bank. We represented them because frequently there are lawfare suits against them. There’s boycotts against them. There’s all kinds of discrimination against them, even beyond other areas of the Jewish homeland, other areas of the state of Israel. And so we’re in constant contact with them. And this is a very important moment. So the Knesset, you know, during the Obama years, instead of saying we don’t like Israel, they started, the Democrats started saying, well, it’s Bibi Netanyahu we don’t like. And then it was, it’s his party, Likud we don’t like. Yeah, but this is not Netanyahu in the leak hood. This is now the third vote, I’m pretty sure, if I’m counting it correctly, the third vote since October 7th that’s made the same point in different ways. No Palestinian state. No more talk about two-state solution. This is nonsense. Two-state solution was never real. It was always a step toward what Arafat called the phased plan for Israel’s destruction, which was the idea that they would take strongholded land and then try to expand it and expand it until there was no Israel left. That’s why maps of Palestine never show any Israel. And so, this is extremely important, where the Knesset, the legislative body, and this is a very solid majority, and it was a super majority of Jewish legislators, said, no, we are extending our sovereignty over Judea and Samaria, and it’s already under Israeli control. But it doesn’t belong to anybody else. It was occupied illegally by Jordan, and now Israel is saying, it’s ours. And it’s a very important sign, it’s a very good sign, and I think there’s no possibility for peace without Israel asserting this control.
SPEAKER 07 :
Jeff, thank you so much for joining us today. I think it’s important for people to also, like you said, open up your Bibles and if you want any proof, if you want to know what actually these areas are, it’s not hard to… I mean, you can find the words even of Jesus and look and there’s Judea, Samaria, all these areas of the world. And whether you’re a believer or not, just from a historical standpoint, you’re looking at thousands of years, as you said, thousands of years of documentation that has been passed down generation to generation to generation for what feels like a millennia at this point. And all of it points back to… If you can take anything out of it, let’s say you’re not a believer, you can at least take out of it that this area and this land of the world, which is still there, is still easily accessible, was for a specific reason and for specific people throughout history. Amen. Thank you, Jeff. I appreciate you calling in and being a part of the show today, as always. And look, when you support the work of the ACLJ, there’s a reason we have the ACLJ Jerusalem. We have a European center. We have the ECLJ. And that’s really talking about Europe. And that’s making sure that similar issues are taken care of. Religious freedom issues are taken care of in Europe. But the ACLJ Jerusalem is very different. The ACLJ Jerusalem acts as the American Center for Law and Justice in Jerusalem. Make sure that we have standing there to talk about what’s important and to show that the American people… are not controlled just by the media and by the way neither is israel as we’ve seen israel be divided we know that it’s not as uh cut and dry as as really as the american press wants to make you believe they want you to believe that it’s some full right-wing dictatorship that’s happening in israel and we simply know that’s not the case and that is also why we have the aclj in jerusalem to make sure that they know that we know that and we’re there to stand up for their freedoms
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, and that’s also another point that Jeff brought up that in this vote that it was a super majority of Jewish lawmakers, which are across the political spectrum. That doesn’t mean that they are all Likud Netanyahu supporters, but they all believe. in the historical homeland and the sovereignty over that of the Jewish state of Israel. So I think that’s also another important thing to point out that you also probably wouldn’t hear on another broadcast. But because we have experts, we have a director of ACLJ Jerusalem that can join us from Jerusalem today like he is, you’re getting this information. You are getting truth that many other networks don’t even want to talk about. They don’t even want to put it on there. They’re fine with having people say from the river to the sea. But here, you’re going to find out what that river is and actually whose homeland that river is. And it’s not who they want you to think it is.
SPEAKER 07 :
Go to ACLJ.org, make a donation today. It also goes to support our international efforts. And we appreciate that as we are headed towards the very end of our 35 years of Justice Drive. We do have about four lines open for you at 1-800-684-3110. Last chance to get on the air today. Welcome back to Sekulow. We do want to hear from you at 1-800-684-3110, 1-800-684-3110. Of course, we are talking about the Tulsi Gabbard updates, all the documents, and now the strike force. And then we’ve all been talking about the unfortunate passing of an American icon, of course. That would be Hulk Hogan, Terry Bollea, someone who, again, beyond the world of professional wrestling, was involved in so much pop culture, so much of our lives. And again, a guy who also got his relationship back with the Lord last year, did a huge thing with the 700 Club and CBN. And was about to start a brand new professional… I guess you’d say it’s professional amateur wrestling, if you will, stand-up freestyle wrestling that comes to Fox Nation here in the next few weeks with our friend Eric Bischoff, which is one of his lifelong best friends. So, of course, our thoughts and prayers are out to our friends that are being affected by that. And, of course, to all the fans out there like me who just have been surrounded by… this larger than life figure our entire lives. So again, our thoughts and prayers out to the whole family. Let’s go ahead and take some phone calls. Let’s go to Wendy, who’s calling in Virginia first. Wendy, you’re watching on YouTube, which we appreciate. If you’re watching on YouTube right now, it’s a great way to support the show. If you’ve never seen us before, about half the people who watch have never seen us ever, each and every day, hit that subscribe button. It’s free and it really does help. Wendy, go ahead.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, I’d like to give my condolences to Hulk Hogan’s family and friends. And I’m also to tell you, I really love you guys. I’ve listened to you for a long time and I’m a little nervous. But anyway, what I’m going to get to the point is, is I have noticed that Tulsi and Trump are extremely firm in what they’re saying and they’re confident. And so I know they have the evidence. And so that, you know, like we’re talking about. 2016 when Obama was in office and, you know, he has immunity for being a setting president at that time. However, what if they find something else outside of his term, something nefarious that he may be having been involved in? You know, Trump has had his life, you know, threatened and he’s, you know, attempted suicide. I mean, attempted assassination against him, you know, a couple of times. So it’s like, Who’s involved with this? Because it didn’t just end with Obama term. I mean, you know, so it’s like, what if they find something else that Obama was involved in illegally?
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, Wendy, I think that and we’re going to play a bite from Tulsi as well, is that I mean, I think that’s one of the reasons why something like a strike force where it is a dedicated team looking into all this. Now, if it’s just based off of the intelligence reports and things of that nature from the time when President Obama was still in office right there at the tail end of 2016, then that would still probably have those complications of the presidential immunity. But, I mean, you bring up a very valid point. We can’t speculate because we don’t know what we don’t know. But I think that they are going to be looking into this and seeing what is able to be done because it was such a horrific thing that was done to our country. And I think we should play Byte 7. This is a reporter asking Tulsi Gabbard about President Obama directly. And you’ll hear the tone that Wendy was even referencing, just how firm she was and confident in what she’s saying. Let’s take a listen. Byte 7.
SPEAKER 02 :
Do you believe that any of this new information implicates former President Obama in criminal behavior? We have referred and will continue to refer all of these documents to the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate the criminal implications of this. Correct. The evidence that we have found and that we have released directly point to President Obama leading the manufacturing of this intelligence assessment. There are multiple pieces of evidence and intelligence that confirm that fact.
SPEAKER 07 :
Again, a lot of intelligence, she said, that confirm that fact. Once again, I’ve said this, and I hope we can get Tulsi on at some point soon because she was obviously a big part of this broadcast for a number of years. But when she’s saying words like that, it really does even perk my ears up when you go, we have a lot of intelligence. We have multiple pieces of evidence and intelligence that confirm that fact. She’s using terms like fact, using terms like treason. This is not a little game here.
SPEAKER 11 :
Right. And as Wendy even pointed out, they are very confident in the statements they’re making. Let’s get to another phone call here. Let’s go ahead and go to Will calling from Ghana on line one, watching on YouTube, not on terrestrial radio.
SPEAKER 07 :
I love that because YouTube, you know, you get to be all around the world, Will. So go ahead. Maybe a delay. Will, you’re on the air. We gave Will a big setup. Let’s go put him on hold and just see. You’ve got to be kidding me. Let’s go to James on line two. James in Arkansas. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 01 :
Well, I’m not in Ghana, but I’m here, brother. All right, James. That’s right. Go ahead. Well, they’re talking about bringing Rensselaer to the White House. If nobody goes to jail, it’s all just…
SPEAKER 07 :
for show it’s like wrestling anyway all right well james i have a couple issues with this whole comment uh number one i know you’re just joking around they’re bringing the ufc uh to the white house the ufc that’s the ultimate fighting that’s real that’s mma also professional wrestling you take a bump and you tell me it’s not real okay okay some of us have done that you know what it hurts you know don’t don’t be besmirching the name not on not on any day however not today he will say he said this whole thing is like professional wrestling how many times have you said politics is wrestling when it comes to the way the characters are built scripts are put together uh look you have a linda mcmahon as part of the administration you had hulk hogan who i believe who just passed away Today, someone who is actually looking at being a part of the administration and the sports council, professional wrestling has played a major part in politics. But also, I’ve always said that I think politics, I think pro wrestling is more real than politics because I’ve seen behind the curtain of both. And I will tell you there’s more reality happening behind the scenes. It’s professional wrestling world than is in Washington, DC. It’s a sad case, but it’s just a true. Do we clear that call or he’s not there? He’s there. He’s there. Let’s go to will again and Ghana. Well, we only got about a minute. Go ahead. Okay. Real quick question.
SPEAKER 08 :
Uh, in December and January, there were two meetings with Obama that was covered by immunity. If the conspiracy continued, and it certainly did after he left office and he had anything to do with it, can he be held accountable?
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, I think, one, it would depend on if he was still in communication or still doing something like that with the work product that he clearly was directing to go forward. But a lot of the people that were in that meeting that got the initial product out then were out of the government. Now, some of the notable exceptions would be someone like James Comey, who was later fired. So James Comey almost disappeared. carried the torch forward. The rest of them got nice contributorships on MSNBC and CNN to be able to continue to perpetrate this lie on the American people. But once again, well, that’s what the this is what the strike force is going to have to look into. They’re going to have to get to the bottom of and figure out what’s possible, what is in this conspiracy not limited by statute of limitations and things of that nature. So we will hopefully be hearing more because it looks like we’re getting a lot of transparency from the government on this and we look forward to seeing what comes of it. But thank you for calling from Ghana.
SPEAKER 07 :
Thanks for calling from Ghana. We got one minute left and that is why we don’t put paywalls in. We make sure we’re available on all outlets around the world. There are people that watch this show around the world. We want to be invested in what’s going on, not only in America, but with the work of the ACLJ, whether it’s our work for religious freedom around the country and also around the world with our ECLJ, our ECLJ Jerusalem. There’s only one way that happens. We’re not supported by major sponsors. We’re not supported by any other ways. We don’t accept legal fees. aclj.org again legal fees i need to clear that up we don’t accept you know everyone who’s a client the aclj does not get charged okay so when you go to aclj.org help it is at no cost to you that is because we have amazing people like you the aclj donor and supporter so i encourage you right now scan that qr code if you’re watching and go to aclj.org today and have your gifts doubled as we wrap up it’s 35 years of justice drive
