Join us as we delve into the ever-crucial debate surrounding free speech and its implications on society. With insights from prominent figures like Mike Pompeo, this episode sheds light on the challenges of upholding free speech in today’s world, especially in light of recent events like the assassination of Charlie Kirk. Our discussion extends to global arenas exploring how political rhetoric and policies might impact allies and the geopolitical landscape.
SPEAKER 04 :
On today’s show, President Trump arrives in England for a state visit as the United Kingdom faces unrest.
SPEAKER 07 :
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 04 :
What ended up becoming a massive, what you could only describe maybe as the MAGA rally of the UK, where hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets, potentially millions, took to the streets in protest for their country. A very patriotic, I guess you’d say, moment as the country or the United Kingdom in general has faced a lot of pressure and a lot of unrest of what’s going on there. I’ve spent a good amount of time there. We’re going to dive into it. We’re going to talk about it and what we’re seeing right now. It’s a state visit. Will, this is something that happens every so often. They’ve been trying to get it handled. President Trump was just out there with King Charles in Windsor Castle. Looking over bands, the royal bands that were playing, neither of them looked all that entertained by it. But you know what? It is what it is. I’m sure those bands are fantastic, but you are sitting out there. It’s evening time. It’s a little bit chilly, probably. It looks a little overcast, looks very typical London right now. And this is happening, of course, in this wild week that has been coming. It’s been one week now. uh since that assassination of charlie kirk and now we’ve seen sort of the fallout as we begin to rebuild and begin to put the pieces back together of what not only society looks like but what even shows like ours look like and of course we’re going to cover the continuing story with there but we also have to move on we have to discuss other things and phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110 I also don’t want you to forget about the incredible work of the ACLJ. Now it’s time to kind of double those efforts and really talk about what’s happening. Jordan’s going to be joining us live from Washington, D.C., our Washington, D.C. headquarters. He’s got a big update for us. And then later on, we even have Mike Pompeo joining us as well.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right. And this state visit by the president to the United Kingdom is his second. He had one during his first term. It’s actually very rare for a president to have two state visits to the same nation. But this is something that King Charles… Even in those two terms? Yes, because it does. It’s a big production. It takes a lot of planning. But it is a very rare thing to have two state visits to the same place.
SPEAKER 04 :
Like there was a flyover.
SPEAKER 06 :
now this is a new king uh this is king charles he went when it was queen elizabeth and there is a lot of of you could say tension between the united states and the united kingdom when it comes to some of the trade policy things of that nature a lot of it is made for tv it’s the pomp and circumstance which president trump loves he loves the uh the pomp and circumstance he loves the history of the the royal family and things of that nature these are all public things but at one point he was
SPEAKER 04 :
calling to rejoin the Commonwealth maybe a few months ago, that we’re all a little bit like, okay, man, I mean, I love the United Kingdom as well, but we got to be careful.
SPEAKER 06 :
But there’s also the policy side where he’ll be meeting with the prime minister and the different heads of state there as well to try and work on some of these trade issues, some of the tech issues, some of these partnerships. But it also is against this backdrop of A polarizing figure, especially in the United Kingdom, is arriving at the time that they are having, as you said, these kind of British MAGA type things happening where there’s free speech, immigration, a lot of these issues that are American. conservatives were concerned about that led to the election of President Trump are taking place in the background. It’s got to be a very tense time for the leadership in England, but we can get into more of that as we go, and also what people think may come of this, and what also people think may happen to one of our closest allies in Europe.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, I mean, you have even people on both sides of the aisle saying that the current government being run in the UK, the Stammer Prime Minister, is not what either the hardcore liberals want or the conservatives want. So you’re about to see some major changes coming out of the UK. And look, I said this before. I know it’s easy to think of the UK currently as like, you know, a small country over there. It’s fine. Like I said before, Brexit came before President Trump, the first term. And it was a big moment. where the UK left the European Union, whether you liked it or not. And to me, I remember sitting there that day. I know exactly where I was with my friends and said, whoa, this is wild. And I bet this is going to indicate what the next few months may look like. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110, 1-800-684-3110. Welcome back to Seculo. Phone lines are open at 1-800-684-3110. We’re monitoring President Trump meeting right now with the royal family as they sent the, what do you call it, the royal carriage. I mean, it is the pomp and circumstance. It is that almost, there always feels like a bit of Monty Python to it. Like there’s a bit of comedy to when you see President Trump having to get in and out of these royal carriages with horse drawn and the beef feeders. I mean, I love it. I think it’s great. But I also, and look, as you said, it’s needed right now as the UK has certainly seen their country and their nation have a bit of unrest. Jordan’s joining us now from Washington, D.C., our Washington, D.C. studio. Jordan, I know you wanted to give an update on what you’re doing there and what the ACLJ is up to as we are currently in the process of expanding our Washington, D.C. legal headquarters.
SPEAKER 05 :
That’s right. So we’ve got a couple of big meetings today, one with a big tech company. I won’t name them, but a big tech company talking about something that is in the news a lot right now, Logan, which is freedom of speech and speech regulation and trying to draw those lines, very difficult lines between What is speech that should be allowed and that’s vigorous and tough? And what is speech that crosses over into an unprotected zone? And that’s been very difficult for these companies for a number of years, but especially so in light of what we’ve seen and experienced in just the past week. But you could even say in the past few years with the political rhetoric certainly getting more intense in the United States. We’re meeting with a U.S. senator here in our office in Washington, D.C., and then meeting on some of the religious liberty issues that the administration is working on as well. And I think almost all of that, when you really think about it, connects to what happened last week when you talk about free speech. religious liberty, and this kind of anti-Christian bias that we see in the United States, and of course, how to deal with that. So even though there are different meetings with different folks and different departments within the ACLJ, you mentioned both our our legal department here, and the growing ACLJ Government Affairs Department, ACLJ Action, there’s a lot to do and a lot to where we can add our expertise. And that’s what I think today is all about, is really trying to introduce the expertise that we have in some of these very tough situations where you’re trying to draw lines through what is protected and what is not protected speech when you’re a group like us and you fall in the line of mostly wanting to protect all kinds of speech.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, and Jordan, these meetings, it’s not as if they were planned in the wake of the tragic assassination last week. This is something that you were looking forward to going and having these discussions, offering your expertise, our team’s expertise, both on the legal and government affairs side out of D.C. But I think it’s also important to show people that. That’s why we have to be in Washington, D.C., is we can have these meetings with both members of the government, members of major, major tech companies that are able to come in and we’re able to go and have these meetings with different companies, different branches of the government. and be able to navigate these very tricky issues, especially in light of what happened last week. I feel like the timeliness of this is almost providential because the issues surrounding speech only got just elevated over the past week. Because of every conversation you’re seeing and every person that is chiming in on something that they need trusted experts, people that they can come to and be like, hey, either whether you’re a platform or the government and come to these experts and be like, hey, we as a platform, what can we do? What should we do? Because their gut reaction, I feel like, and not putting any words, but across the board, any major platform, they’re gut reaction would be like, all right, we need to pull back. We need to make sure that no one gets in trouble for this. But there is a case to be made. We need to protect robust speech in this country and advise these people on how to move forward.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, I mean that could be unfortunate because if you actually remember in the past few years, that is where those companies were. And it was – we were dealing with it. ACLJ was dealing with issues with some of these tech companies. And certainly our rhetoric is not – you know, going to the level of the rhetoric of some of that we’re really talking about here and drawing these fine lines. So we don’t want to go back to where we were with speech, but we also have to get better about the future. And I think a lot of it is also looking into, it’s not exactly, you know, what’s on a poster that someone posts or a post that someone puts up, but it’s, it’s kind of, what is it? What are the discussions that are happening in public that, not in private, but in public, that could be encouraging or inciting or even planning violence and maybe a shift into where these companies are actually looking, that it’s not towards people having a tough discussion in some chat or in somebody’s comments, but it’s actually people maybe inside a group who are posting messages encouraging violence, encouraging And so, you know, I know there’s a lot of talk about hate speech right now and words like that. And again, we’re free speech advocates, so we always fall on the line of robust speech. And I think that that is where we always want to be for our members at the American Center for Law and Justice. Our supporters benefit from robust freedom. Speech protections and the people of faith benefit from robust speech protections. Pro-lifers benefit from robust speech protection. So we always have to be concerned when there could be that kind of, well, maybe we should all just pull back. There’s a difference in a society saying we should tone it down, we can change, and it being forced upon us, if you kind of understand what I’m saying. And I don’t think we ever want it forced upon us because then you see what’s happening in the U.K. That would not be happening. I mean, that is a place where, as we’ve said, does not have those same kind of robust free speech protections like we do in the United States. And you could see some of the ramifications from that of just what’s happened over the weekend.
SPEAKER 04 :
And this week in the UK, it seems like it’s almost an overcorrection every time. It’s like there is an issue. And then they go one or two steps too far. People start getting arrested. People start getting denied entry to the country for simply making some statements that people would consider to be political or insensitive. And not like you said, not like they weren’t political or maybe insensitive. But should that matter in terms of. gaining access when you have a passport to a country or being able to travel or or even just living and working there and you see a lot of the comments right now people are going oh they’re loving watching this with president trump they’re loving the the pageantry they’re loving the royal tradition and that we’re seeing this and it looks like a good thing for america but we know sort of in the background There is this heaviness that has come upon that nation right now. And we are seeing hundreds of thousands of people who have taken to the streets recently. But we’ve also seen that the country itself, the United Kingdom, is in a kind of a gut check moment where they’re having to go, okay, well, who are we? What are we? What do we look like? Because the political spectrum there changes so rapidly. I think it’s also, you know, we kind of take for granted in America the fact that typically… Our president goes a full term. You know, maybe even two terms. We’re in the UK and Israel and all these different places that are Western, if you will. It feels like it’s flip-flopping every day. I mean, it’s not every day, but like three times a season, if you will.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, that’s the difference in the parliamentary system versus our constitutional republic that we have. But Jordan, even that that case, I mean, President Trump is going there in the background for the British officials, which obviously have been planning this for months. Not this isn’t like they decide all of a sudden to invite President Trump. But they are having a movement in their own country, which would celebrate a figure like President Trump. Obviously, they have their own politics in the UK, so it’s not a direct correlation, but it’s a very Trump-style populist movement that’s happening in the UK. Yes. Also, on the backdrop of what happened in the United States, the freedom of speech that that someone like Charlie Kirk utilized and took advantage of and was able to bring on debate is something they are trying to silence in the UK right now.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yes. I mean, right now in the UK, you could not have those discussions legally. I mean, a lot of what he was doing on those college campuses, you could have been arrested for doing and arrested for just having that open kind of dialogue, even in a more friendly setting, which Charlie Kirk was… typically trying to create by telling the crowd to quiet down if it was someone they disagreed with. But listen, we’re kind of in a new moment right now. We know that Europe has been dealing with these issues. We now as a country are dealing with these issues. And I think that the important part is this. We as a people… can regulate. Okay. That’s not about laws. That’s not about, you know, criminal conduct or criminal speech. That’s just self, you know, how we interact, how we disagree. That’s, that’s one thing we do not want is our government becoming a speech police. And that doesn’t mean that all speech, I think that people say, oh, that, you know, you can, you can’t incite violence. You know, all speech cannot be protected, but most speech should be protected.
SPEAKER 04 :
All right. Thank you, Jordan, for joining us from Washington, D.C. We’ll get an update later on as well of how things are going there as we know that they are currently expanding. There’s a lot going on in Washington, D.C., and you want to make sure that our offices are always focused and showcased because we have such an incredible legal team, such an incredible media team here in our Nashville office. And then we have offices around the country and around the world, and we can’t do any of that without you. Just go to ACLJ.org if you can support financially. Do it if you can’t right now. Look, we provide a lot of great free content on our YouTube channel, on Rumble, on ACLJ.org. Spend some time on it. Send it to your friends. We’ll be back with more here on Sekulow. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. Remove topics a little bit, and then Mike Pompeo is going to be joining us in the second half hour. I’m Matt Stekula. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110, 1-800-684-3110. I think we actually want to take one of those phone calls. Let’s go to Jan, who is watching on YouTube right now. Jan, welcome to the show. You’re on the air.
SPEAKER 09 :
Hi, thank you. I listened to a news clip this morning from Pam Bondi, and she made a distinction that there was a difference between freedom of speech and hate speech. And I’m a little concerned about that. When I first heard the phrase political correctness, I knew in my heart that immediately it would be a place for power to determine the definition of that. And I see hate speech, if it is considered at a… classification of speech. It’s another place for political power for definition. And I’d like to put out a possible consideration for you guys to talk about, and that is, could we control, not control, but fix this, quote, hate speech by making it possible for to litigate against slander so that if you’re calling someone a Nancy, you have to be able to defend it.
SPEAKER 04 :
Jan, I think we kind of hit a few different topics here. Of course, the situation with Pam Bondi yesterday, I don’t know if it was the way she spoke about it that came off, like you said. A little concerning. I think it comes off concerning for a lot of reasons. One of the things we always talk about here is when you start changing these rules in politics and start saying, this is hate speech, this isn’t hate speech, this is impeachment material, this isn’t. As soon as you’re out of office, the tide turns and all of a sudden you are the one. being hit with these problems or with these legal ramifications of it so i do think uh tread lightly uh you know pam bondy i think that’s something that i i don’t know if necessarily let’s let her maybe spend time correcting yourselves i’m i’m a fan of hers i think she’s done a really great job but there i understand why maybe your red flags went up in that moment because it is talking about something that we hold very dear here which is the freedom of speech and you know being freedom of speech absolution absolutionist essentially saying you know there is no limit to your freedom of speech in terms of the way the guy let’s not it’s like in really inciting violence or or like we said the old you know fire in a crowded theater but in terms of your point of view it becomes very very uh a slope that is uh could be considered very slippery
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, and to that point, the Attorney General did offer a correction to some degree or a clarification on X. Now, I will say her statement that was the clip that everyone’s saying was unilaterally condemned by both sides of the aisle. Both people on the left who would be afraid that the government would be weaponized against the left and then people on the right that are… Free speech absolutists that are saying the way you combat speech is with more speech, not with the heavy hand of the government prosecuting individuals for statements you disagree with. She did say hate speech that crosses the line into threats of violence is not protected by the First Amendment. It’s a crime for far too long. We’ve watched the radical left normalize threats, calls for assassinations and cheer on political violence. That era is over. She cites 18 USC 875, which says it’s a federal crime to transmit any communication containing any threat to kidnap any person or any threat to injure the person of another and cites a few others where it’s a felony to threaten public officials, members of Congress or their families. So she is pulling it back, saying that hate speech, what she was talking about was direct threats. I still think that… There is a very distinct line to be careful with. Now, the speech of the left has been abhorrent. That doesn’t mean that the vast majority of what people have said is illegal. All the cheering you’ve seen of people… online praising his death saying that they’re happy with it it is disgusting it is repulsive most of what i have seen though is protected by the first amendment as awful speech we don’t want to get to what nina jankowicz which was going to be the ministry of truth the uh disinformation governance board where she was talking about off trying to get rid of awful but lawful speech in the united states the first amendment is a very robust protection of speech of faith of the press and those things are foundational to this country so it is a dangerous road if you start going down the path of pulling back on some of those rights because of the message but as we’ve discussed just because it’s we don’t believe that it should be illegal doesn’t mean there’s not going to be consequences exactly for what you had to say and then we talked about this a bit in the break but we’ve always said that too which is
SPEAKER 04 :
If your employer decides to fire you, which by the way, we’ve seen hundreds, hundreds of people. Those are just the people we know of online. Those are public officials, teachers, a lot of places that have, if you’ve been celebrating the horrific assassination of Charlie Kirk, whether you agree with him or not, if you have been celebrating it and you lost your job over it, too bad. Okay, that is the truth. There are things that you can and can’t say in terms of what you can do in the office. what your employers can tolerate, especially if you work in a state where it’s a right-to-work state, if you’re going out and making threats specifically or even saying anything that, I mean, for a public school teacher, what are you thinking? I mean, I did think that a lot of times. The people who so quickly went to social media and didn’t think to, because they’re in such an echo chamber, they didn’t think that they’d have any pushback. And then of course you have one parent who goes, you know, I think I don’t want this person teaching my kids. And then you start, you know, peeling back that onion layer by layer. And all of a sudden you see, uh, sort of the horrific nature of a lot of the vitriol and the speech that is coming out of people. And again, should that be legal? I mean, if it’s, if it’s, obviously if it’s a direct threat, those kinds of things, that’s not, we’re talking about here. Um, But should it cost you your job? I think that’s up to you. Look, we’ve seen that with some of the news reporters as well. On MSNBC, we saw many people lose their jobs pretty quickly. The person who claims, well, maybe it was a celebratory gunshot that happened. I mean, that was within five minutes, I think, of the Charlie Kirk assassination. Within minutes. We don’t know the motive. Maybe it was someone who was just excited. Of course, we all knew that wasn’t the case. But for some reason, the guy who was on MSNBC thought, oh, I’m going to be tolerated for this. I’m going to be able to say this and get away with it because it’s MSNBC. And you got to at least give it even up to MSNBC for saying, you know what? There is a line even for us.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right. And in reality, and there’s something we’ll play even later in this broadcast that was on ABC News where a journalist was. We can play it. Yeah, we’ve got time. Let’s go ahead and roll this. This is Matt Gutman on ABC News after the text message conversation came out and how he reacted to it by eight.
SPEAKER 02 :
an alleged murder with such specific text messages about the alleged murder weapon, where it was hidden, how it was placed, what was on it, but also it was very touching in a way that I think many of us didn’t expect. A very intimate portrait into this relationship between the suspect’s roommate and the suspect himself, with him repeatedly calling his roommate, who was transitioning, calling him, my love, and I want to protect you, my love. So it was this duality of someone who the attorney said not only jeopardized the life of Charlie Kirk and the crowd, but was doing it in front of children, which is one of the aggravating circumstances of this case. And on the other hand, he was, you know, speaking so lovingly about his partner. So a very interesting and, as Pierre said, riveting press conference.
SPEAKER 04 :
So disgusting and disturbing. This usually happened actually when we start creating a celebrity murder culture, which is if you are a murderer specifically for some sort of weird political cause, all of a sudden you kind of maybe can blame some of the streaming services and some of those for really kind of making this or the podcast or making murderers these like, you know, like I said, celebrity figures. It’s really disgusting when you say, oh, it’s so loving. Look, you could say we’re shocked by the tone. I was shocked by the tone that it was so flippant. that was so conversational after you just committed a murder sure all right hey we got a second half hour coming up let’s talk about it 1-800-684-3110 give me a call so much more coming up if you don’t get it find us on aclj.org keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever this is seculo
SPEAKER 07 :
And now your host, Logan Sekula.
SPEAKER 04 :
Welcome back to Sekula. We are going to take your phone calls at 1-800-684-3110. Kind of bouncing around a few different topics today. President Trump is in the UK right now. He’s currently with the King meeting. There’s the sort of pomp and circumstance of these visits and these flyovers. You’ve seen the Royal Carriage. You’ve seen the beef feeders out there. All of the pomp and circumstance from the United Kingdom rolled out. Essentially what you’d say the proverbial red carpet for President Trump. This is amid the backdrop of of uh london uh being a city of unrest as they have their own version of what you’d consider a mega movement happening and it’s happening in the streets again it happened to coincide sadly uh with that tragic assassination of charlie kirk which a few days after it but that became even more of a rallying we talked to one of my friends who was there who was at the protest and he said you know charlie became the focus of this you know it was run by a few different groups By the way, different groups that were, some were conservative, some were certainly further to the right, were more considered alt-right. And then some groups that were, there were Muslim groups there. There were other groups there, other religions represented, other people of ethnicities represented, because a lot of them immigrated to the UK to become part of Britain, become part of the culture there. And they saw what was happening, and then that part of Britain was slipping away and was changing. and changing rapidly. And that is what those protests were about. Now you have President Trump visiting the King as he knows, he sees it, it’s not like he doesn’t have television, what’s going on. You have their Prime Minister who is continually, when I was there back in July, that was maybe the number one topic was was that Prime Minister even gonna survive his current term or whether he was gonna be ousted, it could have been any day while we were there. That is the nature of, as you said, the parliamentary government in the United Kingdom. And we are also talking about words. We’re also talking about the words that came out a few different places. Pam Bondi had a discussion yesterday that stirred up some people about the necessity of differentiating between hate speech and protected speech. Obviously, that created an uproar on both sides. We have some calls about that. We’ll take that. Then on the other side, you have MSNBC, or you have ABC News. MSNBC originally is what I was thinking of because… They were the ones who people started getting fired immediately. And you had to give it at least up to then, because just if you don’t think speech should be illegal, doesn’t mean there shouldn’t come with some consequences. And you had you had people on MSNBC immediately after the shooting saying, well, we don’t know what the motive was. Maybe it was celebratory. Maybe it was someone on his side, obviously disgusting and disturbing. And then as those text messages that were released yesterday were read at the press conference. These were text messages between the shooter and his roommate slash significant other, spouse, not spouse, but love interest, I guess you’d say. Having a very, what felt like flippant, casual conversation. You know, it does definitely push to the line of, of the way people interact online. It had that vibe to it. You do look at it and go, we have created a culture that not only doesn’t value human life, but they treat it trivially. And they even treat it with their own, the own people that they are going to affect the rest of their lives with in sort of a trivial way. But that is not… the shock that came from the ABC reporter. I think that is completely justified. If he said, when you read this, it’s shocking how casual they are. It’s shocking how much he’s admitting to this and saying, oh, dad’s going to be mad that I lost his gun, grandfather’s gun. Because that’s not the type of verbiage you think you’re coming after someone who has just caused one of the biggest assassinations in recent history. To have this sort of flippant, convenient conversation. But instead… The ABC journalists had to go out there, Matt Gutman, and not only say that he was shocked by it, but he was almost touched by it. And we’re going to talk about that when we get back. You’re going to hear specifically from this reporter on ABC when we get back.
SPEAKER 06 :
He also said there was a heartbreaking duality. the way it tragically is playing out.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, we have those clips. We’ll talk about them when we get back. We’re also going to have Mike Pompeo joining us because he’s got a lot to say also about political violence as someone who has had very significant threats on his life over the last handful of years. We’re going to talk about that and so much more. Remember to support your work here at the ACLJ. Support what we’re doing here. Jordan is in Washington, D.C. as they expand our Washington, D.C. office and studios and of course our media center here. And none of it You know, a lot of these organizations and shows, they got to put it behind a paywall. We are very thankful right now that we don’t have to. In the wake of everything that’s happening, to be able to provide all this content for free without a login or anything like that, it really is amazing. We can’t do it without you. That’s at ACLJ.org. Share it with your friends. Welcome back to Secular. We are now joined by the Senior Counsel for Global Affairs, Mike Pompeo. Secretary Pompeo, it’s obviously been a very hectic week in terms of the fight for free speech and the fight for freedom-loving Americans and people around the world, actually. We saw the outcry happening around the world, whether that was in Europe or the UK, after the tragic events of this week. I’m going to kick it to Will. Let him lead this off because he’s got a lot of questions like we all do. We’re all trying to figure out what comes next.
SPEAKER 06 :
Mr. Secretary, the assassination of Charlie Kirk, it has put America in a very dark place. We’ve turned what seems to be a corner into a realm that we were hoping we’d never be and maybe thought we wouldn’t get to again. And I just wanted to get your take as Christians, as freedom-loving Americans. What should our posture be right now when we react to this political violence and also seeing the celebration of it from so many online?
SPEAKER 01 :
Well, it’s really straightforward. We should do what the Bible tells us, right? Which is that we should defend truth and freedom every place we must. And we need to be very vigorous about doing that. It’s not about responding with violence. That’s inappropriate. It’s also not about having any space whatsoever for those that are calling for violence in response to how conservatives have had an outpouring of love for Charlie Kirk and for his family and for those around him, his friends and his organization. But what we have seen these these individuals celebrating his death. You know, I’m all for a wide range of speech. This is gross task at the highest level and indecent. And maybe they’ve got the right to actually say that, even if we find it hateful. But the institutions that are a part of it have a responsibility to their constituents there. owners, their shareholders, their listeners, their customers, whatever it is they have, to not permit that to be part of an organization that they are part of. They also have the right to prevent their organization from being drugged down this nasty rat hole that some of those celebrating the assassination of Charlie Kirk have engaged in. And so we ought to stay at it. We must stay in this in this debate. That’s what Charlie was doing, right? He was out there that day having wide open, free-ranging debate on complicated subjects with deep emotional division, and he was doing it in a way that was decent and open and in the finest traditions of the United States of America.
SPEAKER 06 :
You have an article up at ACLJ.org. It’s Americans must never give in to political violence. I encourage everyone to go read that there. But I just wanted to bring up, I mean, I think with your your past history as a secretary of state. You have seen and watched carefully and worked with even regimes that do categorize speech. They treat speech in a different way. They don’t have the protections of the freedom of speech like we have in the United States. And you’ve also, as a public figure, I’m sure been the target of nasty rhetoric, of threats from foreign nations. We know all this to be true. But in the United States, you make this point in your piece that Speech is not violence. And the mindset for many has gotten in this country that speech is a form of violence. How do we combat that and continue to be the beacon for the world of the freedoms we have instead of falling into a pattern that we see play out across the world in other places?
SPEAKER 01 :
Yeah, look, it can be a nasty pattern, but that pattern can come from lots of different places in the political spectrum. It most often comes from the hard left. those who truly think that censoring speech is appropriate. It used to be that they were for free speech, and now they find those of us advocating for just decency and civic norms to be speaking in a way that ought not be permitted. One of the things I love about being part of the ACLJ is, in fact, that you all have fought for a long time in the courts to make sure that there was as wide a range as possible for the freedom of speech, for the capacity of people to practice their faith, to worship, to exercise their religious beliefs, and to speak freely about them all across the world. This is what we have to keep doing, but we can’t respond with violence. That makes no sense. This is how other countries operate. We’re bigger than that. We’re better than that. And most importantly, our founders knew that this this set of freedoms that they gave us. Our First Amendment freedoms were foundational to maintaining our Republican, what have delivered the most exceptional nation in the history of civilization for the last 250 years. We ought not walk away from that.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yes, Secretary Pompeo. And of course, it’s been a couple hundred years. And I think that’s very easy for us to think about in big terms in the past. That’s for us hundreds of years, hundreds of years. But when you look at it in the bigger term of the world history, it’s a relatively short amount of time. It’s a relatively short amount of time that has been marked with a lot of bloodshed. A lot of these kind of events, these main moments, I feel like I told the guys, it feels like every 25 years or so, we’re given a wake-up call to what is actually existing in this world in terms of the hate and the darkness. Now we have another moment, too, where you were so involved so deeply in the Abraham Accords, and we have seen Israel just launching a new campaign in their efforts to take over Gaza City. Obviously, a lot of people are upset with Israel right now due to the war being dragged out. We are seeing, honestly, some really kind of, if I’m being totally honest, and we’re going to talk about this a later show, I’m sure, some rhetoric that’s really concerning from both sides of the political spectrum. And it’s becoming more mainstream as the weeks go on, as the days go on, to where my concern starts to ramp up. I understand people see some of the imagery out of Gaza. That is not what I’m talking about. I’m more talking about the conspiratorial nature that people are starting to spin here. But for you, whether public opinion matters in terms of what Israel needs to get done.
SPEAKER 01 :
It does matter at one level, but at the most fundamental level, it doesn’t make any difference. We all have a responsibility when we’re government officials to protect and provide for security for our citizens. And the Israelis are doing nothing but that. They are they are efforting to eliminate the Iranian influence on their border. They killed a couple thousand of their citizens there. and where the political leadership that was sitting in Doha or the leadership that remains in Gaza today has to be eliminated in order for them to protect the basic freedoms in Israel. By the way, freedom is not only for the Jews of Israel, but the Christians and the Arabs that live there too. And so I have seen some of this noise. Those images are very difficult to watch. But if one steps back to first principles about sovereignty and the protection and security for your own citizens, I fully understand what the Israeli objective is. I’m confident they’re doing everything they can to execute in a way that’s consistent with how the IDF has operated for an awfully long time inside the rule of law and international law. And we should give them the space that they need. And they will be doing the world an enormous favor by eliminating the risk of Iran continuing to terrorize not only Israel, but the Gulf Arab states and the United States of America as well. So,
SPEAKER 04 :
Always great to hear from you. Thank you so much for joining us today. We know it’s been a wild week, but having you on here and having those who have been involved in these kind of situations before, it’s always helpful. It’s always maybe a bit calming for those that need some of that. So I always appreciate you joining us, Secretary Pompeo. But I did want to take some phone calls before we get to break. I’d like to take a call. There’s a lot of you calling in about free speech and your concerns about free speech. You’re wondering what it looks like, what we could say, what we can’t say. What does that mean when Pam Bondi says what she said? Let’s go to Warren first on line two, who’s an ACLJ champion. That’s someone that gives on a monthly basis automatically. One of the little perks I give is I’ll jump you to the front of the line. He’s been able to hold the least, but Warren gets up front. Warren, go ahead.
SPEAKER 10 :
Hey, thanks for taking my call. You know, we… Look at all this free speech, and we have the right to say what we want, but we don’t have the right to not suffer the consequences of it. You know, there’s a scripture that we don’t like. I don’t like it, but it’s there, and it says that we will be judged by every idle word that comes out of our mouth. And people face judgment for the words that they speak, and it doesn’t give us the right to incite violence and killing. And God’s judging them, and He’s going to judge us.
SPEAKER 06 :
And to that point as well, the First Amendment does, it covers the government. It is that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or the freedom of religion or the right to assembly or the freedom of press. But it doesn’t mean there aren’t consequences for your private employment. And we’ve seen that across the board. And I see people trying to equivocate saying, oh, look, the right has now become the party of cancel culture. Right. What cancel culture was, was if you were a conservative, you weren’t able to get work in Hollywood or you were being fired from companies because of being a conservative. not going online praising the political assassination of someone. Just saying I’m voting one way or the other. I think it’s ridiculous to try and flip this into a this is a new cancel culture. I mean, I do think it was pretty aggressive. Some people that were going and reporting to every employer they could find. But when you’re a school teacher and you have young children in your care, and you’re making videos online praising a political assassination because you disagreed with someone, that is completely different than wanting small government, lower taxes, and fiscal responsibility and not being able to get hired.
SPEAKER 04 :
You deserve to lose your job. There’s no ifs, ands, or buts around that. I mean, it’s just insane that We would even get to this point. So a bunch of people thinking with their thumbs before thinking with their brains and going, oh, I got to be the first person to comment on this. And I’m going to say something that’s going to rile up my echo chamber. Then you find out there’s two people that are not in your echo chamber that you’ve befriended. And guess what? Cost you your career. Was it worth it? Probably not. Phone lines are open at 1-800-684-3110. We’ve got a bunch of calls coming up, and I want to take them. 1-800-684-3110. I want you to support the work of the ACLJ. We can’t do this show. The show’s fully independent because of you. Support today. Give a donation. ACLJ.org or become an ACLJ champion. We’ll be right back with your calls. Welcome back to Sekulow. Let’s take some phone calls. There’s about two lines open right now. If you want to get your voice heard on the air, we’ll do our best to get to you at 1-800-684-3110. Let’s go to Patty in New Mexico. You’re watching on the Salem News Channel, which, by the way, we’re available every day live there on the Salem News Channel, 12 to 1 p.m. Eastern time. It’s another free offering of the ACLJ. We’re able to provide to be on that network along with a great other host. And honestly, it was the home of the Charlie Kirk show. which you’ve seen now the last two days been hosted by different guest hosts. So they’ve been paying a lot of tributes. And of course our hearts go to everyone there, even at the sale news channel who are dealing with their losses as well. Patty, go ahead though.
SPEAKER 08 :
Oh, hi. I’m new to your program and I really enjoy it. Just very, very good. My comment has to do with Pam Bondi and forgive me if I missed a segment where maybe another caller mentioned this, but I have to say, with Trump’s cabinet, everyone is just incredible and meticulous and articulate when they speak, and you don’t get a lot of people saying, oh, I misspoke, oh, backpedaling, oh, correction. And yet, Pam Bondi seems to be doing this a little more frequently for my liking, and I guess that’s just my thing. I’m not sure about her.
SPEAKER 04 :
I think that’s okay. Go ahead, Patty, continue.
SPEAKER 08 :
No, no, no, I’m sorry. I wish she would think before she spoke. I mean, she’s an AG. Shouldn’t she be more articulate?
SPEAKER 04 :
I think that she is… I’ve met Pam Bonnie before. I know we’ve worked with her many times here at the ACLJ, so we have a lot of respect for her. You do have to remember, she wasn’t the first person in this position, so she was kind of thrown into it as well. That’s not to say that there have not been issues. Will and I discussed that specific one. But you do have to also… I don’t think you have to give grace for people to come up with what’s happening right now or to know, but we’re in a very unprecedented time over the last week. But has she had to back up some of those claims? Yeah, she’s had to. You can complain about it. You can have issues with it. There’s nothing wrong with that, Patty, with having your thoughts and feelings about this. I see them in the chat as well. I see a lot of people share your feelings and thoughts. Now, when it comes down to actually the rule of law or what she’s getting done, I think that’s where you can also turn and go, well, that’s doing a pretty good job.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right, and once again, a little bit of the difference with what we’re seeing from this administration is a lot of the transparency, the speaking freely, which, once again, Patty, can sometimes lead to statements, especially during a passionate time like this where people are very emotional, very upset with what’s going on across the board. But what the Attorney General did say in a follow-up statement In response to that hate speech statement, which was triggering for people across the political spectrum, because traditionally hate speech is not criminalized in this country. It is not a category unto itself. There’s not a carve out in the U.S. First Amendment to our Constitution that says, you know, you shall not abridge the freedom of speech unless it’s hateful. We do have very robust free speech, but she was clarifying and saying in this post on X that citing statutes and saying you cannot call for someone’s murder, you cannot swat a member of Congress, you cannot dox a conservative family and think it will be brushed off as free speech. These acts are punishable crimes and every single threat will be met with the full force of law. That is in line with also the statutes that she posted. I don’t have an issue with that. I don’t have an issue with her clarification, her more targeted statement there. But I do think it should be a reminder to the administration as they are more transparent. transparency is good it’s what the american people crave but also make sure that it is uh the right transparency as well as i mean we saw the fbi director on on capitol hill yesterday he has been and once again today he’s been making the rounds he’s also had hearings he was very combative with some of the senators yesterday that are clips that are going far and wide um And that also, that tone during a very passionate time in this country may not be the right tone that serves the administration long term. So I think these are all things that we have to look at and we can be honest about.
SPEAKER 04 :
I think we had this discussion, Will, and some of it came from even the… episode that jd vance hosted of the charlie kirk show right so there’s there’s a lot of heart there there’s a lot of passion there but i do think there is a line for a lot of people right now which is you’re you’re leading this country and there’s difference between what you feel and what the country needs and i think we have to make sure that that’s uh true across the board i feel like that’s similar pam bondy she can feel that way right now i think a lot of people feel that way right now as they should but long term is that really what the american people need right now And that’s something to talk about. That’s something to discuss. Thanks for calling. Let’s continue on. Let’s go to Michael. Who’s watching on YouTube. Michael, similar comment. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 11 :
How are you guys doing? I just want to say, uh, calling from, uh, Georgetown, Texas. And I want to say this, uh, as a first time listener, I’m going to be a long time listener. And I also want to say that when I come to Pam Bondi saying there’s hate speech and there’s free speech. speech is speech. We can not, uh, draw a line between the two. Then you, then you’re, you’re drawing a line on free speech. There’s, there’s, there’s a way where they use it. If you break in the law, there’s threats there. Then yes, that’s different. The free speech is free.
SPEAKER 06 :
speech you take that away you take away the freedom of free speech well and michael to that point as well is that when she clarified in in the that post on x she was talking about violent threats calling for i would not traditionally think of that as what is defined in culture as hate speech or hateful speech or free speech that is the term that the left was using against charlie kirk going out to have debates they were saying he spews hate speech so i think it was a definitely an unfortunate use of a of a term that is understood within the political collective of what that means when she cites specific statutes though she is specifically talking about threatening, harassment, things of those natures, which there can be criminal consequences for.
SPEAKER 04 :
Michael, thank you for calling. Let’s go to Eddie. Last call of the day, Eddie. We only have two minutes left on air, so you’ve got to keep it quick. On Salem News Channel, go ahead.
SPEAKER 03 :
Thank you. I’m in Houston. I’m getting you guys over there on the TV. You know, I feel like Kirk’s assassination, I think it was just a useless sacrifice that he made because Right now, if this was to happen to Trump, if you think that the sickos have come out celebrating this, what happened to Kirk, let something like this happen to Trump.
SPEAKER 04 :
And I think it’s going to be more of the same. It’s been a wake-up call for me that people that I would have considered very close friends and family, I mean not family, but close friends, have said such horrific things after the shooting of someone. These are people who I’ve had over at my house and had dinner with, and they’re close friends who I would never have thought… that politics would get in the way of humanity and we’ve seen that now it’s such a mass scale that it’s shocking and it’s disturbing and you’re right eddie this happened to even a more prominent figure because i saw many people said well i didn’t even know who he was people that were on the left never heard of the name okay well that’s different you know what we do live in echo chambers so there’s a chance if you’re a 40 something year old liberal you maybe never heard the name charlie kirk But yeah, it does open my eyes to what the future could look like if this gets worse and worse. But Eddie, we pray it won’t. And I appreciate everyone who has watched. Thank you to all the new listeners, by the way, today. If you’re new and you’re watching online, a great way to help support the show is also to just subscribe. If you’re on YouTube or on Rumble, great way to keep informed every day we do this show, Monday to Friday. noon to 1 p.m. Eastern time. You can work your way back from there, depending on what your time zone is. Of course, it’s available on demand at any time through ACLJ.org, our app, or of course, all of those social platforms. And get engaged and get involved if you can by making a donation at ACLJ.org of any kind and know how much it really goes to make sure this show and our legal organization remain fully independent. Talk to you tomorrow.
