Join us for an eye-opening discussion on the Abraham Accords and their impact on peace in the Middle East. AS Rick Grinnell deals with issues at the Kennedy Center, a deeper look is offered at America’s domestic policies paralleling political strategies in the global arena. Listen in to diverse opinions from callers on birthright citizenship and the constitutional debates that shape our nation’s policies.
SPEAKER 09 :
We’ve got breaking news. President Trump once again blocked in federal court.
SPEAKER 07 :
Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Logan Secular.
SPEAKER 09 :
It’s Thursday, July 10th. That’s right. I always want to make sure I state that at the beginning of the show is when it sounds like it could be a rerun, but it is not once again. Another judge. stepped in the way of president trump you may go logan the supreme court i thought ruled about this but then you guys had what happened last week they found a loophole well once again this is another loophole and this is breaking news when i say breaking news i mean it we were struggling to figure out what we were going to lead with today and i just was like you know you guys got to keep refreshing the page It’s like when you’re waiting for like a ticket master for tickets. As you know, something against the Trump administration around 10 o’clock will break. And this broke. And that is they judges come in and blocked the birthright citizenship order, even despite the Supreme Court ruling specifically on this issue with a very nuanced approach. And look, I’ve said the whole this whole situation. I’m not sure what side I land on in terms of the actual birthright citizenship portion about this. But whether President Trump has the right to do this, I think is a very different story.
SPEAKER 08 :
They figured out another loophole to put in a pause. That’s right. So this is a federal judge out of New Hampshire this time that issued a preliminary injunction. And the way that this was done was by issuing a class action certification for a class of plaintiffs, which are, in this case, infants. And one of our people on our legal team said, I wonder if it includes the unborn or if it’s only born babies, but that are protected by this. But when you look at what they did, it actually tracks by finding a loophole with what was brought up in the opinion by Justice Barrett. Where she was arguing nationwide injunctions are trying to shortcut around rules that are already in place and have been for a long time. Specifically, Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which governs. the rigorous process of certifying a class for a class action suit that would allow a judge to offer broader relief than just the plaintiffs before the court and that’s exactly what this judge has done here he has certified a class that will receive relief from the court now Here’s what we don’t know yet, Logan. The opinion, the written opinion by this judge, he has not put out yet that goes along with this order. So we need to see that to really understand if he did something that Justice Alito was concerned about. Right now, it’s just a top line. kind of breaking news headline if you will and the judge said that order and that opinion will be out later today but justice alito put this actually i’m going to save it for the next segment because justice alito had a warning about what could happen even though he joined the opinion in full by justice barrett in his concurrence he kind of issued a warning and we’re going to get into that when we come back because that’s what we don’t know If this judge was going against what justice Alito warned about, or if he followed this rigorous process, we’re going to keep you updated on this topic.
SPEAKER 09 :
It’s going to keep unfolding as we go. So make sure you don’t go anywhere. As we head into this first break, phone lines have just opened up and they’re ready for you. Give us a call at 1-800-684-3110. It can be on the specific issue or it can be about the actual kind of lawsuit issue of this, the class action issue. For all, you know, representing all children who are yet able to speak. And look, again, I think we have to have our own decisions on what you think birthright citizenship means. And I’m sure we all have different opinions on that. That’s not really the question. It was the same reason why we were representing West Virginia. That wasn’t the concern. The concern was President Trump being able to actually take action and get things done. Speaking of taking action and getting things done, here at the ACLJ, we’ve been fighting for you for the last 35 years, and that’s why we are in our 35 years of Justice Drive. Your donations are doubled right now. We had a big day yesterday. A lot of clowns were being sent in. We had a lot of fun. But today, we’ve got to double down again. Your donations are doubled. Go to ACLJ.org slash 35. Scan that QR code that’s on your screen. Rick Grinnell will be joining us a little bit later. phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110 i did want to restate the breaking news as we have a lot of you just joining us right now and i’m going to ask you if you’re watching on youtube you’re watching on rumble however you watch uh hit that thumbs up right now if you especially if you’re watching on youtube we have to make sure we get this into more people’s feeds it’s not going to be the number one story of the news today but we’re going to try to break in as much as we can because it is a big moment so again Hit that thumbs up or throw a comment, and that really helps out. If you want to be a part of the show, even more so, phone lines are open at 1-800-684-3110. But this is another federal judge coming in, blocking one of President Trump’s plans, now saying that the birthright citizenship argument can be turned into a class action argument, a class action on behalf of all infants. Again, now testing sort of the powers of the lower courts versus the Supreme Court that seemed to the intentionality of the Supreme Court may not have been this.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right. And what we heard from Justice Alito through his concurring opinion in his concurrence with Justice Barrett’s opinion was. was that he did join the decision in full, but here’s kind of the warning he put out. He said, putting the kibosh on universal injunctions does nothing to disrupt Rule 23’s requirements. Of course, Rule 23 may permit the certification of nationwide classes in some discrete scenarios. But district courts should not view today’s decision as an invitation to certify nationwide classes without scrupulous adherence to the rigors of Rule 23. Otherwise, the universal injunction will return from the grave under the guise of nationwide class relief, and today’s decision will be of little more than minor academic interest.”
SPEAKER 09 :
He almost gave them the idea.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah. And he says, lax enforcement of requirements for third-party standing and class certification would create a potentially significant loophole to today’s decision. Federal courts should thus be vigilant against such potential abuses of these tools. I do not understand the court’s decision to reflect any disagreement with these concerns, so I join its decision in full. But once again, that’s the warning and also kind of a… Although not the full opinion of the court in his concurrence is kind of putting the courts on notice of saying, you better follow the rules in this specific rule, Rule 23. That’s what we don’t know currently about what this judge in New Hampshire has done. Has he followed that process and scrupulously adhered to the process of Rule 23 in granting the class? Because this group had already filed this lawsuit before the Supreme Court decision. However, they filed a motion to make a protected class within this lawsuit after the opinion of the Supreme Court, and that is what this judge has granted. We will see if he followed Rule 23 strongly, but I think If he didn’t, it also gives the government an opportunity on an appeal to try and overturn this. It is interesting because once again, the issue at hand is the one that is more, I would say, gray area, even on the right, as far as whether the birthright citizenship order should have even been a thing. But that, once again, is kind of the test for all of these issues that we’re seeing play out of the judicial power versus executive power.
SPEAKER 09 :
I want to take a phone call. I know a lot of you have very specific questions that are coming in. We’ll try to answer as many as we can. And if we can’t answer it, we’ll turn to some of our legal experts and get them to weigh in as well, because they always are listening and watching, even if they’re not on air. And Rick Grinnell will be joining us a little bit later so he can answer some of those as well. Let’s go to Dan, who is calling in California on line one. Dan’s listening on the radio, which we appreciate. For those who listen on terrestrial radio know that some of your networks don’t carry the full half hour. They are full hour and they should. But if you want to watch the full hour, we broadcast every day from noon to 1 PM Eastern time on ACLJ.org live. Dan, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 03 :
Um, what is the constitutional argument for an alien versus being a U S citizen? And if I were to even put a finer point upon it, if, if a penalty has been imposed in the citizens, uh, Home country. Why can’t we just carry out the same sentence? I don’t understand the constitutional argument.
SPEAKER 09 :
dan that gets a little hairy i would say we can we can talk about that but in terms of what the depends on obviously what country they’re coming from why are they here did they seek some sort of asylum because they were unjustly uh you know you know given some sort of law that’s very anti-american you got to think about all of the different countries people come in from and why uh they may have some sort of criminal record doesn’t always mean it would be an american criminal record if you will now of course we’re talking about murder we’re talking about assault all those kind of things it’s very different But if we are talking about religious discrimination, that’s a broad reason the ACLJ team is here. We work with those people who are seeking asylum specifically for their religious beliefs because we know in a lot of these countries, specifically in different areas of the world, including the Middle East, sometimes that has to happen. But in terms of how someone who is a legal citizen and what you consider, I guess you said, an alien or someone who is here not legally, here illegally, how they are treated, it should be very different. However, it feels like there’s a lot of crying going on when that is what happens.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, and Dan, the point about why couldn’t the US just implement some sort of sentence that occurred in another country? With all its issues that we see going on today, with the conflicts between the executive and the judges, between the Supreme Court rulings and limiting and even the loud dissents that you see within these opinions, the United States has the best legal system in the world. Because the bedrock of that system is our Constitution. So I don’t think that we would ever want to start to bring in other nations’ legal systems by trying to carry out their sentences that happen there because they’re inferior systems. So I think that would be to the detriment of the United States. That should not happen. However, the situation you have is that the best remedy for that wouldn’t be, in my opinion, if someone is a convicted criminal in a foreign country, you send them back to the country and let them carry that out. We wouldn’t want the U.S. taxpayer to then be putting someone in our prison system that we would then have the taxpayer is the one who pays that for a crime that committed in another country send them back to that country and let them be dealt with there but that one dan that would run afoul if we were to start carrying out other legal systems yeah due process rights all sorts of issues that we do not want to do because of the strength of our legal system yeah no i’m not a fan of that dan but i do understand the question thank you for calling uh we do have a lot of calls so i’m curious should we take some of these calls will should we keep going because these this i know this is opening up a can of worms
SPEAKER 09 :
A lot of people are going, wait, should have this been settled? What happened here? Let’s go to Michael first, who’s calling in Florida. Michael, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 06 :
Gentlemen, my question is, don’t we have a layer of quote-unquote protection for the executive orders and, quite frankly, the rule of law?
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, it does feel, obviously, these feel politically motivated. Right. They’re going to feel politically motivated. Why? Because they are politically motivated. Now, that’s not to say that Republicans haven’t done the same thing. It’s not to say that this isn’t part of playing the game in Washington, D.C. It’s just a bit more on Front Street right now because we weren’t able to see it and track it over and over and over again. It’s also because President Trump has taken a lot of quick actions. So he took a lot of quick actions right when he started. And with that, you had the answers coming in from these judges very quickly. And then it became a trend. And then it became a moment for celebrity and popularity. Because if you’re one of these judges that can stop one of President Trump’s quote unquote, you know, problematic bills or whatever it may be, then maybe you can become hero worshipped. So remember, ego plays a huge part of this. There are good judges. I don’t want to act like every judge is a bad judge. There are specific ones who, sure, that are unsavory, but there are a lot that are doing good things. We’ve seen some big successes recently, even what’s going on. Though Massachusetts, we know what we have in Planned Parenthood. We also have an update on how we’re getting involved in even more of those pro-life fights. A lot of times, those are with judges who are at least sympathetic.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right. So we are now we yesterday we found out that Planned Parenthood with the defunding issue that they took to federal district court in Massachusetts. They had asked for an extension of the temporary restraining order to last even longer because they had a scheduling conflict with one of the nine lawyers that was on the case. So they filed a motion with the judge. The Trump administration pushed back and said, hey, why don’t we do the hearing earlier? Let’s not give them more time. They’re the ones who brought the suit. Let’s go ahead and move this up. The judge actually agreed with the Trump administration, even though this judge has issued injunctions against the president, has has really been a key judge, an Obama appointee for some of the left’s lawfare carrying out against the actions of the administration. But said, let’s move the hearing up. The briefing schedule remains the same. And the ACLJ will be filing tomorrow with that court.
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s right. Tomorrow we’re filing in federal court to defund Planned Parenthood after that judge blocked President Trump’s defunding bill. We’re a part of that right now. You could be a part of it as well. The fight for justice is not just our legacy. It is also our future. We are engaged in so many cases and so much happening, whether that’s in the media or in the court. And we’ve been doing that for over 35 years. We want to see it happen for another 35 years. We’re only getting started because of you right now. I’m going to encourage you. Go to ACLJ.org slash 35. Again, we’re involved in these cases each and every day. So have your gifts doubled today through our 35 years of Justice Drive. That is at aclj.org slash 35. A little bit later, I’ll go into in detail the many different things that we are getting involved in just this week. And stay on hold if you’re on hold. Greg, Dan, Gene, we have three lines open for you at 1-800-684-3110. But make those donations if you can right now. Rick Grinnell will be joining us in just a few minutes. Welcome back to Secular. In a little bit, we’re going to be joined by Rick Grinnell, but we’re also going to take your phone calls and questions during this half hour and next half hour. We’ve got a question coming in. It’s a little unrelated, but I think it’s okay. Questions, we speak sometimes in our own vernacular. We don’t give you time to break things down. We speak very fast. We only have an hour, probably about 52 minutes of content to give you all the information we can. Sometimes I understand some of the content we give you, we maybe don’t give enough context. So let’s go to Dan in Wyoming, who’s an ACLJ champion, so he gets bumped up to the front of the line. Dan, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, okay. My question was, you talk a lot about the Abraham Accords, and I’m not really sure exactly what it is. I thought maybe one of you guys could explain that.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, I think we can probably both explain that and why the Abraham Accords were so important and are so impactful. Essentially, it’s an agreement, a normalization agreement, between many different… Arab and Middle Eastern countries and Israel. So pre Abraham Accords, they didn’t necessarily have a friendly relationship. Travel was sometimes restricted. Tourism was sometimes restricted. Trade was restricted. A lot of things happened. President Trump came in with obviously with Mike Pompeo and a whole new group and were able to create these almost normalization agreements between many of these areas and Israel. including the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, a lot of places where Israeli tourism couldn’t really happen. And not necessarily for a specific reason, because you go to the UAE, yes, a lot of these are Muslim countries, but they’re not the most traditional Muslim countries. They are like the Las Vegas of Muslim countries, especially in the UAE. So they were able to actually have moments where they had Hanukkah celebrations. in the UAE, things you never thought you’d see, normalized air travel, that your passport could be Israel and you could get into these places without being any issues. This was starting really what could have been the diplomatic peace in the Middle East, if you will. I was very moved by it. It was very powerful. It was signed into law the first time during the first Trump administration. Now, again, it kind of didn’t go away, but the conversations went away about furthering it. Now we’re starting to see that pick back up.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right, because this allowed things like diplomatic relations to occur in having ambassadors to these countries, opening up embassies, allowing travel, as you said, allowing economic relationships to make.
SPEAKER 01 :
Right there.
SPEAKER 08 :
Right there. These are their neighbors. And so they had no relationship with many of these countries. Now, Israel has had diplomatic relations with Jordan and Egypt for a long time, but there’s very few actual countries within the region that Israel has these relationships with. Now this began to change in 2020 under the leadership of the Trump administration with Mike Pompeo really helping spearhead this as well as the president. And like you said, Bahrain, the UAE, Morocco, and Sudan all became signatories to these treaties, these normalizations. And Israel is part of that. With Israel, right. So countries that were hostile to Israel for some of these countries for their entire existence now have a normalized relationship. And there are talks looking forward that there could be other countries added to this list now that an administration that cares about this is back in the position to normalize these relationships.
SPEAKER 09 :
We have to go back to the first Trump administration and remember that there was relative peace in the Middle East. There was relative peace uh with israelis and with muslims israelis and arabs this was not the contentious world that we lived in right now president trump ended isis and with that the abraham courts were founded now we saw chaos break out whether that was in afghanistan or other places over the biden administration maybe the biggest heartbreak to me of president trump losing um and not being able to be have a second term immediately after was sort of the the degradation of the of the abraham courts and what was to follow And actually, you could probably go back to those shows of me yelling, saying he needs to talk more about this in the campaign. President Trump needs to talk about how amazing this moment is. And yes, it’s not the most America based, but the stabilization of the Middle East obviously impacts all of us. And now we see the chaos in the Middle East right now with Israel and Gaza and Iran and all of the different things that have come out. I mean, and not too far away, Ukraine and Russia and all of the chaos that has broken out, all the different wars that have come out of the last decade. Five years. It’s really unfortunate, but I hope you understand how important that was to us, and it’s still important that the Abraham Accords are taken seriously, as we want to see that normalization in the Middle East. We’ve got a couple more calls, got a couple more minutes here in this segment. I do want to encourage you, if you don’t get us for the second half hour, find us broadcasting live right now. We’re on YouTube, Rumble, ACLJ.org, and of course archived later on, however you get your podcasts. You can find us right now, though, at ACLJ.org, and you can make that donation during this specific 35 years of Justice Drive, where we are. really celebrating not just this 35 years but the next generation of aclj attorneys aclj media personalities you’ve seen a lot of change over the last few years and we are building and rebuilding continually it is never about being stagnant it’s just about being authentic and with that i ask for your support at aclj.org 35 again aclj.org 35 and get on hold right now at 1-800-684-3110 that’s 1-800-684-31 one zero we do have a call kind of related to the what we just came off of and i understand but let’s take it steven’s calling in new york on youtube uh steven you’re on the air okay uh i didn’t expect this but what i said to them so i don’t know what you mean you didn’t expect it what what’s going on
SPEAKER 04 :
I didn’t expect to get a hold of anybody that I could talk to.
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, you’re on the radio and on digital platforms to millions of people right now, so you’ve got about a minute.
SPEAKER 04 :
I’ll get to the point. There you go. What troubles me is these riots that have been disguised as protests are getting out of hand people are getting killed now ice agents are getting killed people’s business are being looted and burned and it needs to stop we need to stop focusing so much on the middle east and get the war here under control because we’re being attacked from within steven all right thank you so much i’m only cutting you off because we’re running out of time and because of your sound quality here but steven i don’t think those have to be uh
SPEAKER 09 :
Right. Our government, hopefully, can both monitor what’s happening in the Middle East and also in the streets. We also have individual state governments that should be doing stuff. Sure, California’s not doing near as much as it could have. Other areas, not doing as much as they could have. We’ll talk to Rick Grinnell about that. Of course, we’ve had the situations that have come out of California and other places. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be focusing on what’s happening on the streets or where you are in New York. Obviously, a lot of us spend a lot of time in New York. In New York City, I do as well. And sure, you can feel the difference. But we also have to watch the media. If you go to New York, I’ve said this, it’d be a huge place. I was in London last week. Same thing. Sure, there’s a lot of chaos happening. You gotta be careful. But it’s not like everywhere you turn is chaos. You are seeing a media version of this, whether that’s from your conservative media or your liberal media. They’re all gonna paint a different picture. And it’s similar to the riots that happened in LA. Sure, they were happening, but it wasn’t like that business as usual wasn’t happening in a lot of places as well. So you got to remember that these are humongous areas that you’re seeing one street corner. And always remember that. Again, that street corner is important. I think we can’t lose sight of that. But what I’ve said in New York is that you’ll stumble upon a lot of protests, but you won’t necessarily be inundated by it. It’s not like everywhere you go, you’ll see these riots in the streets and everything. Now you’ll see protections up higher. You’ll see you go to Walgreens and you can’t get your Advil. I mean, it’s concerning. I get it. We’re going to keep your conversation going. 1-800-684-3110 to be on the air. And yes, if you call in and you make it through the phone screening process, the next step is you will be on the air potentially. So I just want to make sure you understand that. Expect to talk to us. 1-800-684-3110. Go to ACLJ.org if you want to support the work. And if you’re brand new and you’ve never seen us before, hit that subscribe button on YouTube. We know about half of you who watch, never seen us before, never seen our beautiful faces, Will. But today they have, and I’m going to ask you to join the over 500,000 and six, 506,000 YouTube subscribers alone that join us each and every day. keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever this is seculo and now your host logan seculo welcome to the second half hour of seculo for today i like to say it’s july 10th 2025 because you may hear this here rogue judges here uh blocking president trump ago oh that’s a summer rerun but it’s not This is what’s happening today. Right before we went on the air, another judge blocked a President Trump plan. Of course, this was one that comes out of the birthright citizenship order. And the Supreme Court warned of this, Will. As you said, Justice Alito warned of this, said, look, if this is the way we’re going to rule, though I’m in for it. know that this is going to be the plan is to again kind of change it into these sort of class action lawsuits and that is what happened and they’re filing on behalf of all infants all infants who are born here in america and of course the nuance of this law is president trump wants it to be i believe you have to have a a u.s citizen as one of your parents either that or someone who is here legally on a a more permanent visa people coming to america tourism a Coming to America right before they have a baby, tourism babies have their baby, and all of a sudden they get full American citizenship and rights. Look, I’ll be honest. If you talk about the actual specific issue, I’m kind of in favor of if you’re born here. I understand that people are abusing that. It’s not the baby’s fault, but I kind of do believe that if you’re born here, you do have some rights as an American citizen. That being said, I understand the concern. But what the main concern is, is that these judges keep figuring out ways to stop anything really from moving forward.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right. And the basis of the opinion of Justice Barrett was that why nationwide injunctions and universal injunctions were not permissible is that there were actual things on the books, Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, that help in situations that may be extraordinary, that may need a broader protection. Now, what happened here, we don’t quite know because we haven’t seen the written order yet. We’re expecting to get that later today, per the judge who said, basically, I’m granting this and you will have my written order later that lays out my reasoning. So we will see if he went through the rigorous process and more scrupulous process that is required by Rule 23. And he may have. He may have done and it may fit. But it does show that at least on this particular issue, there are ways around this. the nationwide injunction ban because there is a process to get a class action before a judge which would affect people that are not parties to the lawsuit directly that are not plaintiffs directly in this situation so we’ll see how that works out we will read the order when it comes out and see but as of right now we are seeing What is another broad injunction against this executive order and this time using Rule 23, which governs class action suits?
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s right. Look, we only got a minute and a half in this segment, so we’re not going to be able to take calls until the end. Go ahead, call in, get on hold. We got four lines open for you right now. 1-800-684-3110. Dean and Greg, stay on hold. I know you’ve been on hold for a little while, but we will get to you in the next segment. Next segment is Rick Grinnell. Followed by that, we’ll take your calls and questions. And if you have a question or or comment for rick you can also call in 1-800-684-3110 look it is an important time you’re just coming off the holidays i know a lot of you starting to get back from your maybe your summer vacations uh i hate that summer is rapidly coming to a close for a lot of us but i don’t want it to be that way let’s keep summer going for a while and we’re going to do that with the aclj 35 years of justice drive well nothing says summer more than 35 years of justice i can imagine it sand umbrellas, gavels, beaches, judicial blocks, so much. Support the work of the ACLJ. You can do that by going to ACLJ.org and have your gifts doubled today because amazing ACLJ champions and supporters are ready to unlock their matching donation. Again, that’s at ACLJ.org slash 35. We’re doing so much this week. Our team isn’t on vacation, never on vacation. We got teams working 24 hours a day, and I mean that. to help you, the American people, and all of you around the world as well through our ECLJ, it’s the European Center, and of course the ACLJ Jerusalem. We’ll be right back with Rick Grinnell. Welcome back to Seculo. I want to get some more calls coming in right now. We got four lines open, 1-800-684-3110. We’re going to be joined by Rick Grinnell here in just a moment, but I want to give you the opportunity to call in and get ready because in the last segment of the show, we’ll take as many calls as we possibly can. We’re going to go to Rick Grinnell first. Rick, well, one thing Will brought to my attention, it seems like you’re having some issues there at the Kennedy Center, and we’re thinking about you.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, thank you very much. I mean, we are experiencing firsthand what it’s like to have deferred maintenance and budget lies about an institution as great as the Kennedy Center. We had a broken sewer pipe that flooded a large portion of the basement of the Kennedy Center. And this is directly related to not doing basic maintenance over the years, pretending like we were. The previous leadership had really lied about the budget. They created $21 million in phony revenue to make the budget look like it was balanced. We caught that. We’ve turned it over to the authorities. And now we’re trying to clean up the mess at the Kennedy Center. Thank God for President Trump. He came, he saw the condition of the center, and in this big, beautiful bill, There’s $257 million to refurbish the Kennedy Center so that we don’t have these problems. We have, you know, this is America’s arts institution, which is a monument to John F. Kennedy, the living monument. And so we’ve got to maintain this building. And thank God that President Trump saw it and is going to fix it.
SPEAKER 08 :
Rick, I feel like the issues with the Kennedy Center are almost a symbol or analogy for what happened to the government as a whole under the past four years, where things would be said, put forward, everything’s fine, the border is secure. when behind the scenes, everything was falling apart. And so the the lies that were told to the American people are now coming out in the open. And what you’re describing here is it seems like the perfect analogy that when you took over at the Kennedy Center, everyone was saying it’s going to ruin this great institution. How dare President Trump put someone as controversial as Rick Grinnell ahead of this wonderful institution when in reality, behind the scenes, nothing was fixed, everything was wasted, and we’re seeing the fruits of what real work now can happen under new leadership.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, look, I think these are complicated issues, and it does take people who want to dig in and understand the issues. That’s what President Trump did. He came over to look at the place. Again, it’s a living memorial, much like some of the other monuments in Washington, D.C. It’s a building and a memorial to John F. Kennedy. Happens to be a performing arts center. And One thing that we believe very strongly is that we shouldn’t have to take program money to have ongoing programs and shows at the Kennedy Center from public dollars. What I’m trying to do is to say we will take public dollars for the building, since it’s a museum and a living memorial, to upkeep the building. But in terms of the art center, in terms of the programming for the arts, we don’t want to take public money. We want to be able to make decisions about programming that attract the public and that pay for the programs themselves. We believe in arts education, but you can’t do arts education unless you have some money coming in and paying the bills some other way.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, you actually can draw an audience. There’s plenty of artists ready and plenty of other shows and everything ready to bring in those audience there to the Kennedy Center. It doesn’t all have to be fringe. There’s always a good place for that kind of content. But also you can have your mainstream content that people want to see. People want to come out from the areas to see. And I know your team is working hard at that. But Rick, I did also want to pivot a little bit from the Kennedy Center. We saw, well, was it oversight hearing? Talking to President Biden’s doctor. And of course, once again, without saying it, seems to have proven what we’ve all knew all along well.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right. It was supposed to be a closed-door deposition. It wasn’t supposed to be televised. But they put the video out after the fact where the doctor to the president, the previous president, decided to take the Fifth Amendment, assert his Fifth Amendment privilege over basic questioning. One of which was? Were you ever told to lie to the American people about the condition of the president? And he asserted his privileges under the Fifth Amendment. Rick, what was your take on that?
SPEAKER 02 :
Look, I’m a firm believer that you get to take an amendment and exercise it. It’s part of the Constitution. If you don’t want to answer questions because you believe that it’s a political prosecution or…
SPEAKER 09 :
Rick, I think let’s try reconnecting with Rick real quick. It’s having some connection difficulties right there. But I do think that is part of the story here is not necessarily the Fifth Amendment. I think we’re all pro Fifth Amendment. I think we’re actually I’m kind of pro some sort of medical privacy as well. Right. however this is the president united states and was under a lot of scrutiny specifically for this and they didn’t ask for the president’s uh what his medical conditions were anything like that they asked were you ever asked to lie about them of which he decided to take the fifth amendment of course like you said i think it’s his right to be able to take the fifth amendment but it does you know make everybody’s uh little you know question mark uh float over their heads
SPEAKER 08 :
Now, also sometimes within Fifth Amendment assertion, in situations like that, as we saw with someone like Lois Lerner, that was obviously the person who was behind the scandal of the Obama administration that was attacking Tea Party groups. But asserting your Fifth Amendment privilege sometimes is because – You have to assert it in a deposition like that across the board, or else if you break that, then you start testifying on something, then you’re no longer covered. So it makes for a good moment on TV and says a lot about the willingness to talk about it. But once again, Rick, can you finish up what you were saying when we lost you there for a second about this whole situation?
SPEAKER 02 :
Look, I firmly believe in the Constitution. I think you have every right to take the fifth. And what that means is not commenting in a process and a proceeding where you think you’re not getting a fair trial or what you say might damage yourself. And you’re not the focus of this. And so I get it and I understand it. And I think it’s a powerful tool that we need protecting. But I also think that when you take the fifth, there are some consequences, which is you’re not being transparent. People are going to assume the worst. And so you have to know what you’re getting into. I think that there’s a different bar for taking the fifth when it comes to the presidency of the United States. If it’s a process… um, about what, what the president made in terms of a decision. I’m all for taking the fifth and saying, I’m not going to tell you what the criteria was or what our conversation was when I was having, uh, giving advice to the president of the United States. I get that. However, this is about the health of the president. This is the doctor who was, uh, trying to, um, ensure that the president of the United States was healthy. If he or she knows something about, that the president of the United States was not healthy and there was a cover-up, this is of public concern. Transparency is crucial. And I do think that this doctor makes a mistake for not just coming clean and saying what he believes. If he believes Joe Biden was absolutely with it and had no problems and could do the job, then that doctor should tell us, I checked him out, I think he was healthy, and I think that he was fit to be president. That would settle it because then it would be a he said, she said, we saw things that you didn’t. And so this would be kind of a conversation back and forth between two political parties. That’s not what happened here. This guy, when asked, was Joe Biden fit to be president, said, I’m not going to talk about it. I think that’s problematic. I think that is evident that he can’t tell us that Joe Biden was fit.
SPEAKER 09 :
Rick, thank you so much for joining us today. It’s always good to hear from you wherever you are in the world and whatever’s happening. It’s always such invaluable advice that you really can bring to the table because you say stuff that a lot of people have never been in these situations like you have and you’re able to bring that expertise. know how much we appreciate it. Right now, though, phone lines are open for you. I would love to hear from you. We’ve heard from Rick Grinnell. We’ve heard from some great members of our team. We’re always in touch with our legal team. So if you have questions or comments related to that, you can call in as well. But we do have a bunch of lines open right now. I always like to say we have thousands of people who watch each and every day. A lot of people on their keyboards who are ready to throw in a comment. But I’d love for them to call in. We’d love to hear from you at 1-800-684-3110. Wherever you are in the whole world, you can call in. 1-800- 684-3110. And again, if you want to support the work of the ACLJ, I want to read through some of the amazing stuff we’re doing right now. Tomorrow, we’re filing in federal court to defund Planned Parenthood after a far-left judge blocked President Trump’s defunding bill. Today, we are filing a major brief with the Supreme Court to defend prayer. We’re submitting written testimony today to the Massachusetts legislature to stop those attacks on pro-life pregnancy centers. And yesterday… We just sent a demand letters to the UN defending Israel from new lawfare attacks. That’s just the last 24 hours in the next 24 hours. Pretty wild to have the resources we need to continue these fights and to engage on all levels like we have the last 35 years. And for another 35 years to come, we’re going to need your support. So right now, I encourage you go to ACLJ.org. during our 35 years of Justice Drive. So go to aclj.org slash 35. Make your donation today. It’ll be effectively doubled by one of our great ACLJ champions. We’ll be right back with your calls and comments. Welcome back to Secula. We’re going to take as many calls as we can. We’ve still got two lines, three lines now. Someone hung up. Three lines open at 1-800-684-7000. 3-1-1-0. So call in right now. We do have an ACLJ champion currently on hold. So you get bumped to the front of the line. A champion is someone that gives on a monthly recurring basis. Gives us a great, like I say, a baseline. So let’s go to Michelle calling from California. ACLJ champion. Know how much we appreciate you. Thank you. You are on the air.
SPEAKER 01 :
Thank you very much. Okay, so my opinion is that we do need to rein in the birthright citizenship, but either way, whether they are citizens or not, it is the parents’ responsibility to support their kids, starting with paying for their hospital stay where they have their kids. These parents get all sorts of money from our government, and I believe that needs to stop.
SPEAKER 09 :
Okay, I mean, Michelle, there’s a lot of conversation about where government waste is, what it actually is, what it doesn’t. Obviously, there’s things like emergency room care. You can’t deny care. Of course, they get charged, but that becomes a whole different situation. A lot of people have their insurance providers, but if you’re talking about people that come here, maybe a tourist or that, I don’t know the ins and outs of all of that well, but maybe you do you.
SPEAKER 08 :
well i mean i think it’s a very broad uh issue because there’s more than 150 000 each year that are would be affected by the well that are specifically from two parents that are not uh do not have citizenship so that what this order would affect they estimate about 150 000 a year now um they’re like we said there are many issues with it there are people that uh that actually have the means and money to come and almost as a uh status symbol or a novelty or even uh for future use will come and plan to have their child here have a get a visa and extend that to maximize the time here so that they can have a child here to get citizenship for that that would be a different case than people who are here that are undocumented for uh maybe even multiple generations that the parents have no legal status, but their children are born here. That’s something that President Obama tried to affect with the DACA ruling where those were childhood arrivals, the children came here. Now, many of those children that would have been covered under DACA, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, may be having children. And so their children would have citizenship under the 14th Amendment. And it is a complex issue and actually one that many on the right aren’t aren’t fully sure where they land on it or may disagree with the president. That is one of the reasons why the left has made this kind of the issue. And and they fought over this on some of the ancillary issues instead of any of the other specific issues. executive orders that have been challenged in court because this one uh the pr from the left is a lot easier to uh get into some of the right people on the conservative side that may agree with the left saying i don’t know that this executive order is is means yeah all right let’s go ahead and take a couple more calls before we wrap up for the day let’s go to dean you’ve been a hold for a long time dean we appreciate it uh listening on sirius xm you’re on the air
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, I grew up in the Sacramento area in a Hispanic neighborhood. And my neighbor was born in Sacramento, Catholic hospital during World War II to two migrant farm workers. After the war, they went back to Mexico. When he immigrated to the United States in the 60s, he had to become a naturalized citizen just like anybody else. And I honestly, growing up in a Hispanic neighborhood, don’t know anybody older than me that was given citizenship because they were born here. It was all people younger than me, and I’m in my 50s. So when did this start?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, the text of the Constitution in the 14th Amendment says that all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. Now, I don’t know the ins and outs of the Sacramento neighborhood or situations there or paperwork or maybe even those parents declined citizenship. to want their children to be citizens. There was a big movement with individuals that would come here and still wanted to be citizens of the previous country because of their pride. They were here for work. But that also may have been the case, Dean, that culturally they did not want their children to be American citizens because they were a citizen of somewhere else. There are ways that they could decline the citizenship, even if someone was born here. But the issue that is being fought over is that that text of all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. What the Trump administration is arguing through this order is really about the and subject to the jurisdiction thereof line. not the all persons born in line, because they’re arguing that if the parents were not here legally or they were here on a tourism visa, then they are not subject to the jurisdiction thereof. But that is what this entire battle is about. The President Trump is saying this amendment to the Constitution… This was in the late 1800s.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, 1868, I believe, more than 150 years ago. You can at least infer that some of this had to do with the end of the slave trade. So, of course, there’s some of that as well going, okay, the… The cause of this was probably very noble.
SPEAKER 08 :
The cause of the amendment specifically was for people that were in the United States that were former slaves, freed slaves, were not considered citizens of the United States, even if they were born here, had been here for many generations. And children. Children here, they were not considered citizens because of the Dred Scott case and situations where they were not considered citizens of the United States. The 14th Amendment gave them citizenship and protected them as citizens of the United States. So the argument, though, of, well, that was about something different. also is not a very conservative legal argument because we believe the plain text of the constitution is the plain text so they are arguing over and the subject to the jurisdiction thereof phrase within section one of the 14th amendment and we’re not even close to the merits of that case yet and we’ll see how the interpretation is is interpreted by the courts but i think even some conservative supreme court justices logan would probably be more textualists on this and so don’t be surprised if once it gets to the supreme court even if on these injunctions issues they’ve ruled one way they may disagree with the president on this issue right on the specific issue not necessarily whether he could do it or not on the issue oh we just lost what i thought was going to be our last call of the day uh but unfortunately they hang out hung up but it’s okay we only got about a minute and 43 seconds we can filibuster that well can we get to my favorite story of the day oh yeah the op-ed in the washington post put it on the screen because the washington post got an op-ed that said i’m a clown and donald trump is not one of us uh and then this other headline is uh i should know What this person’s arguing is that you’re offending us clowns. The clown community. When the liberals call President Trump and all of us clowns, that’s offensive because we are artists.
SPEAKER 09 :
So what do we always say, Will? Send in the clowns. Put in your comments, your clown comments. Hey, we got that clown image still? Can we get to that or no? I don’t know. There it is. Support the work of the ACLJ right now with Bubba Hogan himself. Scan that QR code. Be a part of the team. Okay, that’s enough of Bobo. We can go back to our normal. There you go. Your donations are doubled today at ACLJ.org. I just had that ready just in case we were going to get to clowns. Look, we can discuss that more. You know, I saw one article that said profanity is not cool anymore because President Trump uses salty language. Maybe that’s okay. You know what? Maybe there are certain things that we’ve said. You know, we come around. President Trump does it and that’s all right. I’m seeing all the clowns come in. Look, it’s Thursday. This is a great time before you get Friday to give and support the ACLJ. Donations are doubled throughout this month. It is the ACLJ 35 years of justice drive. I want you to have your gifts doubled right now. Sorry, I’m giggling. I’m seeing all the clowns, all the honka honkas coming in. Go to ACLJ.org, scan the QR code, be a part of the team today. We’ll be right back tomorrow with more on Sekulow. Hit that sub. See you then.
