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In today’s episode, Joseph Backholm discusses critical geopolitical developments including the recent ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. Congressman Keith Self provides insights into Israel’s strategic needs and the potential long-term effects of this peace arrangement in the tumultuous Middle East. The dialogue further delves into the global impact of the recent U.S. election results, exploring whether the Trump administration’s return will shift international politics and influence key allies and adversaries around the world.
SPEAKER 10 :
from the heart of our nation’s capital in Washington, D.C., bringing compelling interviews, insightful analysis, taking you beyond the headlines and soundbites into conversations with our nation’s leaders and newsmakers, all from a biblical worldview. Sitting in for Tony is today’s host, Joseph Backholm.
SPEAKER 14 :
Welcome to this Tuesday edition of Washington Watch. I am Joseph Backholm. It’s my pleasure to be with you today on the program. In the Biden administration, the State Department has used its influence around the world to push progressive political priorities on other nations. How quickly can this be changed in the next Trump administration? And is President Trump committed to changing it? We’ll discuss that today. Also, big news, as you just heard from the news desk, out of corporate America as Walmart decides to drop their DEI programs. Has Walmart seen the errors of the ways, or are they just responding to changing cultural moods? Will the rest of corporate America follow their lead? We’ll discuss all of that later as well. But first, our headlines. About an hour and a half ago, Israel’s National Security Cabinet announced its 10-to-1 vote in favor of a ceasefire deal to end the fighting with the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah on the Jewish nation’s northern border. Shortly after, President Biden delivered remarks from the White House Rose Garden, stating that the deal would take effect at 4 a.m. tomorrow local time.
SPEAKER 11 :
Today I… I have some good news to report from the Middle East. I just spoke with the Prime Minister of Israel and Lebanon. I’m pleased to announce that their governments have accepted the United States’ proposal to end the devastating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.
SPEAKER 14 :
So what does this mean for Israel and the multiple front war that it’s been fighting since October 7th terrorist attack by Hamas? Joining me now to discuss it is Congressman Keith Self who served our country for 25 years before retiring with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Today he’s a member of the House Veterans Affairs Committee and the Foreign Affairs Committee. He represents the Third Congressional District of Texas. Congressman Self, welcome back to Washington Watch.
SPEAKER 03 :
Good to see you, Joseph. Thank you.
SPEAKER 14 :
Good to see you, sir. What’s your response to the news of this ceasefire?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, I think that Israel needed this ceasefire. They have been fighting a long time. They need to get the people that have been taken out of their homes near the border back into their homes. They need to focus on finishing Hamas, and they need to focus on Iran in the long term. So I think that’s why they’re doing it. And frankly, they’ve moved Hezbollah back to the Lutani River. which the UNIFIL is supposed to have been doing for decades now and didn’t. So they have simply reestablished the United Nations line at the Lutani River, and Hezbollah will stay behind that now. So I think Israel needed this, and I think it’s come at a good time for them to focus on the broader picture in the Middle East.
SPEAKER 14 :
So do you think the timing of this is a function of the fact that Israel feels they have accomplished their mission with this conflict with Hezbollah?
SPEAKER 03 :
I think that’s entirely reasonable because they have destroyed a lot of their leadership and they’ve destroyed a huge percentage of the missiles that Hezbollah had. We used to hear that they had 150,000 missiles targeted at Israel. And I understand that they’ve destroyed a large percentage of that. So, yes, I believe that you can make the case that in the short term they have accomplished their mission.
SPEAKER 14 :
Do you think this ceasefire announcement will have any impact on their ongoing conflict with Hamas?
SPEAKER 03 :
No, I think they will continue to defend themselves over the long term in Gaza against Hamas. And eventually they may have to turn to Iran to take care of Iran, providing weapons and support. to all of the proxies in the region of Israel. So no, I think they’ve done what they need to in Lebanon. I think they will turn their attention back to Gaza. They’ll give their armed forces a rest, and they’ll focus on the broader picture. I actually like this. I don’t think Biden gets any credit for it at all, but I’m glad that Israel is taking time to rearm, arrest their troops, and get ready for the future.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, I want to explore that comment you made there about Biden not getting any credit for it at all. And of course, he’d like some credit as he kind of moves out of office. But we know that there just was an election and the Trump administration is moving in. Some people think the Trump effect, quote unquote, is having a lot of implications even before he takes office. Do you think the recent election results were relevant to the timing of this ceasefire?
SPEAKER 03 :
Absolutely. We’re seeing it around the world. Canada and Mexico responded within hours of his threat of tariffs. Hamas, back to Hamas, Hamas said we need to end this thing quickly, right after, I think it was literally the day after the election results were known. So absolutely, I think that the Trump effect, people are realizing that Trump is serious this time in reestablishing the credibility of the United States around the world. So we’ve got world leaders, flying in to visit with Trump. So absolutely, the Trump effect is real. So yes, I do. Do you think the ceasefire will last? That’s a great question, Joseph. And frankly, the children in all of the surrounding areas have been indoctrinated for so long to hate Jews, to hate Israel. This is what they face in the future. How long will it last? I have no idea. Remember Hamas said, if you leave us in place, we will do October 7th time and time and time again. So you have a great question. Long term, meaning years from now, five years, 10 years from now. I don’t know because of the indoctrination of the children in these areas.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah, and that is, of course, that’s a millennia-old problem at this point. We know that this conflict, while there are modern versions of it, is far and away not a new challenge, one that we will continue to have to deal with, unfortunately. But I’d like to turn our attention to another conflict, the one in Ukraine. Russia said today that retaliatory actions are being prepared there. after Ukraine struck Russian military installations with more U.S.-supplied longer-range missiles. Now, do you think that’s saber-rattling from Moscow or is it a cause for real concern?
SPEAKER 03 :
It’s a cause for real concern across Europe. I think that Europe is the one that is poking the bear in this case. And I just hope that Putin is very patient until Trump gets into office, because it looks to me like the European allies, along with the Biden administration, with the ATACOMs, the ATACOMs can’t get to Moscow, but they can certainly get deep into Russia. Britain and France have allowed use of their similar missiles. So I think that we need to be very careful because this is the possibility of a mistake. And major wars start with mistakes. If you think of the lead up to World War I, the lead up to World War II, there was this, you called it saber rattling, but these events that happen and eventually a spark. either a mistake, the attack on Pearl Harbor, which was intentional. But this lead up to this time period, these next two months, is very concerning to me. And I hope, again, that Putin is very patient with what our European allies are doing. We do not want to provoke a wider war. We need to get Trump in there to settle this thing quickly.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, as we know, the Biden administration has changed some policies by supplying these longer range missiles. And they say they’re doing that in response to Russia’s importing of North Korean troops. Do you believe that? Is it Russia’s change that has led to the Biden administration’s change? Or is there something else going on?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, I’m not sure that’s… No, I don’t believe that is true. Now, the ATACMs that they provided can get into the Kursk area, which is where Ukraine invaded, and a little bit further. But no, I don’t believe that the North Korean troops are the reason. So I would say the North Korean troops are there to provide manpower for this slog that the Russians are doing. They are greatly depleted. The Russian military is greatly depleted. There are estimates that it would take them 10 years to rebuild their military. So if they are cornered, and you know what a cornered animal is like, they’re desperate. Do not push a cornered animal, because Russia is desperate today. And frankly, I like the Danish model that the European allies are asking Ukraine to build their own weapons systems because Ukraine factories are working at about a 30 percent capability. So they can build more weapons rather than supplying them U.S. weapons, which we may need in the future in our focus toward China. So I like that Danish model that they’re talking about. Let the Ukrainians build their own weapons systems.
SPEAKER 14 :
We’ve seen throughout this conflict in Ukraine that the Biden administration has provided support, but not all the support they could. And they seem to want to give Ukraine enough to defend themselves, but not necessarily enough to win because there’s always been this fear of escalation. Has the Biden administration gotten over that fear of escalation in the kind of waning hours of their administration?
SPEAKER 03 :
I think they’re in panic mode. They will do anything to keep Trump out of office. And I believe this is another effort to do that. But frankly, you’re exactly right. For years, they gave them enough not to lose, not enough to win. You’re exactly right. So now, since the election, they’ve made this decision. I see it as the panic mode to do something, just like they did on the border. They’re in the panic mode because Trump will take office. on January the 20th. I think this is a move of desperation to try to get something stirred up on the European continent.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, expand on that if you would, to get something stirred up because obviously Trump is going to take, he is going to go into office and so he is going to be determining the US policy in the region. What do you think the Biden administration fears at this point that has driven them to really make some significant changes in their policy?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, they have said all along that they support Ukraine, but as we just discussed, they’ve not given them enough support to win, just enough to drag out the war. Why is that? Is it the defense industrial base that simply wants to sell more weapons? The problem is our defense industrial base cannot supply enough for a major regional war in the Pacific. We can’t transport people there even, much less the weapons systems. We measure our guided missile systems in numbers of weeks, not months, not years. So we don’t have enough of our own. I have no idea what the Biden administration is doing. But again, I see this as a move of desperation. Will something happen on the European continent that will drag us into another European war? God forbid.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, you hint at, and President Trump, while campaigning, seems to believe that he can bring this conflict to an expeditious end. How would he do that?
SPEAKER 03 :
Real simple. First of all, enforce the sanctions on Russian oil. Import, I’m sorry, export LNG to Europe so that they would be dependent on American energy, not Russian energy. That would starve the Russian war machine. They sell their oil surreptitiously around the world, clandestinely around the world. And that is what is funding their basic wartime economy, which is what they have today, a wartime economy funded by the sales of their fossil fuels. And we would cut that off. We would also cut off weapons systems coming from Iran, North Korea and China. And, frankly, we would starve Russia out, and they would then come to the table.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, in about 30 seconds, if it would be that simple to starve Russia’s military capability, why hasn’t that been done already?
SPEAKER 03 :
Look, the Biden administration has not enforced the sanction against either Russia or Iran. Take Iran. They had $4 billion when Trump left office. They now have like $100 billion in reserves. Why? Because we don’t enforce the sanctions on Iran oil export that we should be enforcing. We can also starve Iran. But Russia is what we’re discussing here. We could do it very easily. Just cut off their exports, enforce the sanctions around the world. And I think Trump will probably do that, along with us drilling, pulling our liquid gold out of the ground. I think we will put a quick end to this.
SPEAKER 14 :
That would be good news for all of us. Congressman Keith Self, thank you so much for your time.
SPEAKER 03 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 14 :
After the break, the woke-oriented foreign policy of the Biden administration, is it about to end? We’ll discuss it when we come back.
SPEAKER 04 :
The throne of Jesus Christ is unchallenged. His name was never on the ballot to begin with, and it’s never gonna be on the ballot. He’s the King of Kings and he’s the Lord of Lords, and nothing’s gonna change that. And so our mission stays the same, preach the gospel, make disciples, get ready for heaven. In the meantime, that we’re to advance the concerns of the kingdom of God here on earth.
SPEAKER 05 :
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SPEAKER 02 :
Let’s not be discouraged. Don’t lose heart. Don’t lose the faith. Stand now strong because the Lord has given us the great privilege of living in a time when our choices matter, when our lives matter, when our courage matters. So let’s stand together and save this great country. God bless the United States of America.
SPEAKER 01 :
The American Republic has a freedom like no other. It has roots in the scriptures far more than any other heritage. And if we as followers of Jesus and conservatives don’t defend it, who will?
SPEAKER 08 :
Neutrality is not an option. There are many Christians who believe that if we just keep our heads down, if we just don’t say the wrong thing, that somehow we will come out of this unscathed. You’re naive if you think that, because what they want from us is not our silence. What they want from us is our submission.
SPEAKER 07 :
Part of the dilemma of Christianity in our generation is that we’ve relied a little too much on human wisdom and human reasoning, human strength, human resource, and we’ve relied too little on the power of God and God’s ability to open doors that we can’t open and do things that we couldn’t even hope to begin to do.
SPEAKER 09 :
This may not be an easy task, But we are living in a moment of challenge, but also a great opportunity. And we know always that we are not alone, that his spirit empowers us and protects us, and that he can do the unimaginable. Dobbs, after all, was never supposed to happen.
SPEAKER 05 :
Father, we thank you. You have entrusted us with this moment in history, and I pray that we would be found faithful, and that as a result of our faithfulness to you, that thousands, millions would come into the kingdom as they would experience the forgiveness of sin and the new life that is found only in Jesus Christ. Amen.
SPEAKER 14 :
Welcome back to Washington Watch. I’m Joseph Backholm, sitting in for Tony. Yesterday on the program, we talked about how the incoming Trump administration can refocus the Defense Department back toward its mission, which is to provide military forces needed to deter war and ensure our nation’s security. Now, of course, that’s not the only department that’s lost sight of its mission because of a focus on left-wing ideology. And today, we want to turn to the State Department, which is supposed to work for the benefit of the American people and the international community, but has also been skewing toward fringe aspects of U.S. domestic social issues and away from enduring core U.S. values. How has the Biden administration deviated? And how can we course correct? Joining me now to discuss this is Dr. Eric Borden-Kircher, a research fellow at UCLA’s Center for Middle East Development. He publishes extensively on Middle East politics and U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Dr. Borden-Kircher, welcome back to Washington Watch.
SPEAKER 13 :
Thank you, Joseph. My pleasure.
SPEAKER 14 :
Good to have you. Now, before we get into the State Department discussion, because I know you care about such things, I’d like to get your quick take on the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah.
SPEAKER 13 :
I was very surprised by the announcement. I didn’t think it would happen. One of the key things I think we need to look towards or keep an eye on is the Lebanese state. The Lebanese state is very weak. It doesn’t have the ability to basically enforce its laws throughout its territory. Most obvious example is the fact that Hezbollah does what it wants. It launched a war against Israel without the input, without the support of the Lebanese people. So therefore, going forward here, if this ceasefire comes to fruition, I think the big question is how long or if it will be maintained. And ultimately, that’s going to be up to the Lebanese state if it can do its job. Historically, it has not. So I don’t have a whole lot of faith in this lasting very long. And I think we will witness further rounds of violence.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, it is concerning because, of course, it’s a long-term problem. But for now, we’re going to turn to the subject of this segment. And the reason we brought you here today is about the State Department. And how would you describe kind of the priorities of the State Department under the Biden administration?
SPEAKER 13 :
I’m sorry, it froze there for a second.
SPEAKER 14 :
Can you repeat the question? Sure. How would you describe the priorities of the State Department under the Biden administration?
SPEAKER 13 :
I think they’ve often been out of whack. They have focused on issues that really do not advance our national interest. They, in the long term, I think ultimately create more problems than they resolve. They push us away from opportunities at prosperity. which is one of the key fundamental issues in regards to what U.S. foreign policy is supposed to do. It’s supposed to protect our country and further our interests, further our prosperity. And by focusing on these woke or in just a more greater sense, a progressive kind of orientation, it hurts us. It hurts us with our allies particularly. And I think it is a waste of time. It’s a waste of energy in regards to the US government and particularly the State Department.
SPEAKER 14 :
Do you have some examples of how that has played itself out? How has the State Department attempted to kind of export progressive politics around the world?
SPEAKER 13 :
Well, for example, the president has created offices within the State Department, like special representatives, like envoys. He has the ability to do this. He has the power to do it. And for example, there is a woman in the State Department, Desiree Cormier-Smith, who is a special representative on racial equity and justice. And she has gone around the world proclaiming, celebrating these DEI elements, emphasizing diversity, equity, inclusivity. And so, for example, she’s gone to places like Jordan as someone who studies the Middle East. And she goes into Jordan and she lectured the Jordanians on inclusivity. inclusivity in regards to their African population, which makes up like 2% or less than 2% of the population. So it raises a question. It’s kind of like, what are our priorities? Where is our money? Where are our energies best used? Dealing with a country like Jordan and then focusing on 2% to 1% of the population doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. She’s also done this in Europe in regards to the Roma people. And where is the US interest, national security interest, in regards to addressing the Roma people? Why is this a priority? Why is American tax dollars being put towards these kind of agendas? And one of the things that this does is, and I think this has come out in some of this reporting that the New York Times has refused to publish, is that it creates more friction often within these countries than ameliorating problems. And kind of getting back to the question you asked at the beginning of the segment here in regards to Lebanon, it extenuates divisions. Lebanon is a very divided country. It is a country that actually has institutionalized these diversity, equity, inclusivity by incorporating all the religious communities into the government. But by doing that, it has created a weak sense of nationhood and you get a lot of feuds between various communities. So instead of bringing nations together, what it does is it starts to slowly pull them apart. And then it also pulls the United States away from our partners, willing partners, our allies, because it also creates some distrust between the United States and these countries, because ultimately you’re kind of going after the culture of these countries, particularly in the developing world, where they hold Christianity to be a very important element of their society and to attack Christianity and to impose or, you know, leverage Christianity non-Christian beliefs on their society, they see that as a threat. And the leadership sometimes sees this as a threat as well, because leadership in some of these countries derives legitimacy through their culture. So they see this as an attack on their society.
SPEAKER 14 :
And is this a form of kind of imperialism? Because we know that progressivism innately or historically is kind of anti-imperialism. Is this just an ideological form of imperialism?
SPEAKER 13 :
Yeah, I agree with what you said. I think it is a, you could say, a civilizing mission. They have their own idea of what civilizations should be, and they’re going out there and trying to impose it on particularly the developing world. So Western European American society, they want to see replicated throughout the world. They want to see, you could say, a woke global order in a sense.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, yeah, and there is evidence of that. And that’s, in fact, what the State Department has been doing. Dr. Borden-Kircher, I’d like to ask you to stay over. I want to continue this conversation with you and really see how might the Trump administration change the State Department priorities. That’s our conversation when we come back. Stay with us. Everything we do begins as an idea. Before there can be acts of courage, there must be the belief that some things are worth sacrificing for. Before there can be marriage, there is the idea that man should not be alone. Before there was freedom, there was the idea that individuals are created equal. It’s true that all ideas have consequences, but we’re less aware that all consequences are the fruit of ideas. Before there was murder, there was hate. Before there was a Holocaust, there was the belief by some people that other people are undesirable. Our beliefs determine our behavior, and our beliefs about life’s biggest questions determine our worldview. Where did I come from? Who decides what is right and wrong? What happens when I die? Our answers to these questions explain why people see the world so differently. Debates about abortion are really disagreements about where life gets its value. Debates over sexuality and gender and marriage are really disagreements about whether the rules are made by us or for us. What we think of as political debates are often much more than that. They’re disagreements about the purpose of our lives and the source of truth. As Christians, our goal must be to think biblically about everything. Our goal is to help you see beyond red and blue, left and right, to see the battle of ideas at the root of it all. Our goal is to equip Christians with a biblical worldview and help them advance and defend the faith in their families, communities, and the public square. Cultural renewal doesn’t begin with campaigns and elections. It begins with individuals turning from lies to truth. But that won’t happen if people can’t recognize a lie and don’t believe truth exists. We want to help you see the spiritual war behind the political war, the truth claims behind the press release, and the forest from the trees. Welcome back to Washington Watch. I’m Joseph Abakhol and I’m sitting in for Tony today. If you’ve just joined us, I’m continuing my conversation with Dr. Eric Bordenkircher on the woke foreign policy of the Biden administration and the attempts specifically of the State Department to export progressive priorities like DEI, CRT, and LGBT things. So Dr. Bordenkircher, thank you for staying with us.
SPEAKER 13 :
My pleasure, Joseph.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, I think we’ve seen in the last election that even here in the U.S., there’s a bit of a pushback on these things. And it seems that the idea that men can become women and have babies if they want to, that is losing momentum, perhaps even in the West and in the U.S. How are those ideas being received in places like the Middle East?
SPEAKER 13 :
They’re not well received at all. I think the… Biden administration has focused a lot of this woke stuff on Africa, South America, and part of Asia. I think they’ve, to a large extent, avoided the Middle East, although there have been examples in regards to the embassies where they put up the, I guess, the progress pride flag, and they tweet about it in the U.S., An embassy account in Kuwait tweeted about this, I think in 2022, about people being tolerant of other people’s beliefs. And that actually provoked a strong backlash by the Kuwaiti foreign ministry. The US charge d’affaires was called in and told that this is not appropriate for our culture. Joseph, one of the things I should also mention, I didn’t get to talk about in the previous segment was that promoting this stuff in particularly in places like Africa, South America, and even the middle East to lesser extent, uh, works against our interests in another way. It, it, it, makes these countries look towards places like china towards russia who do not bring this element to the table in regards to relations and these developing countries will offer start to look more favorably on china when they want to maybe do a national infrastructure project where they need the assistance of a more advanced uh um state or have the capabilities of like United States, China, and they will pick China over the United States because they’re not going to expect the developing world to follow these woke ideas.
SPEAKER 14 :
I think that is an important point that we don’t want to drive potential friends to our enemies simply because we’re behaving unreasonably. And I think that’s, it’s an understated but very real challenge here. But we have a new administration coming in and I want you to talk for a moment about how simple or difficult it is for a new administration to kind of change the priorities of the State Department. Is this a flip that can be switched? Or is this an ideology that’s deeply embedded in the State Department that’s going to be hard to root out?
SPEAKER 13 :
I think it’s a little bit of both. I think certain positions, like I was talking about Desiree Cormier-Smith, her positions of special representative for racial equity and justice, that won’t be carried over by the Trump administration. So you have some of these special envoys that deal with these issues and are promoting some of these issues in their work. I don’t think you will see that under the Trump administration. I think the Trump administration wants to advance prosperity. The Trump administration, I think also too, has demonstrated it doesn’t want to get involved in the politics, the social aspects of countries, that they’re a little more respective of the sovereignty. So I don’t envision the Trump administration making this a priority or a big part of its agenda. But at the same time, a lot of these ideas are pretty well ingratiated with a lot of the bureaucrats in Washington, particularly in the State Department, and then also in USAID as well. So they may not make these issues very prominent in their work during the Trump administration, but I think they will be there and will continue to kind of permeate under the surface to a certain extent. I think this is a struggle. This is an issue that the conservative, the Christian elements of the United States are going to have to confront and address for an extended period of time. I don’t think it’s just going to be one administration four years and hey, it’s done and over with. I don’t think it’s going to go away very soon. And also to look at how our universities operate and particularly the more prominent universities who are feeders into the State Department. A lot of students I’ve taught at some of these universities, they’re ingratiated in this stuff and they’re thinking about it a lot. So it’s going to be there for an extended period of time.
SPEAKER 14 :
How much authority will new Secretary of State Marco Rubio have to perhaps remove and replace personnel within the State Department who might now be in conflict with the Trump administration priorities?
SPEAKER 13 :
I would think that would be something that they would want to do. I think based on what President Trump has said about kind of clearing out some of the government. So I would assume that some of the, particularly these political positions, I think will get changed out. I really think the big issue going forward with this woke agenda and our foreign policy is with USAID. and what they’re doing. And I know that has come up in the last couple of years in Congress about continuing to fund that and continuing to have that exist. What the process is to go about canceling something like that, I’m not that knowledgeable about those kinds of procedural things.
SPEAKER 14 :
Well, we will continue to track that because what we don’t want to have happen is the U.S. using its influence to export things that are really destructive around the world. We’ve seen the impact here. We don’t want to send that to anyone else. Dr. Borden Kircher, thank you so much for your time today. My pleasure. On the other side of the break, more wokeness or maybe it’s even less wokeness. Walmart has made a significant and encouraging announcement, and we’ll talk about it when we come back. Stay with us here on Washington News.
SPEAKER 05 :
Hello, I’m Tony Perkins, president of Family Research Council here in Washington, D.C. Behind me is one of the most recognizable buildings in all the world, the U.S. Capitol. What does it stand for? Well, most people say government. But you know, the Bible talks about four institutions of government. You know what they are? And do we have a republic or a democracy? Well, what do you say? Also, what about this thing, separation of church and state? Does that mean Christians shouldn’t be involved in government? Guess what? We address those issues and more in our new God and Government course. I invite you to join us to see what the historical record and the Bible has to say about government. Join us for God and Government.
SPEAKER 14 :
The world is hurting, streets are filled with crime, families are broken, sin is celebrated, and God is mocked. Everywhere we look, the wages of our sin are on full display. As Christians, we know that surrender to God’s will is the solution to our biggest problems, but not everyone agrees. Even in church, we hear people say the most important thing is to be tolerant, that we shouldn’t impose a morality on other people, and that loving our neighbor means celebrating what they do. But you can’t do that. It’s not that you don’t love your neighbor. You do. But you care about God’s opinion more than your neighbor’s opinion, and this makes you different. In fact, sometimes it makes you feel alone, like you are the only one. But there is good news. You are not alone, not even close. Research has found that there are 59 million American adults who are a lot like you. There are millions of people around the country who are born again, deeply committed to practicing their faith, and believe the Bible is the reliable Word of God. But that’s not all. They’re also engaged in our government. They’re voters. They’re more likely to be involved in their community, and they’re making a difference in elections. The problem is that a lot of them feel alone, too. We want to change that. FRC wants to connect these 59 million Americans to speak the truth together, no matter the cost. If you want to learn more about this group and what it means to be a spiritually active, governance-engaged conservative, or if you want to find out if you are one of these sage cons yourself, go to frc.org slash sagecon and take the quiz to find out. The world is hurting and we have the solution. We can’t do it alone, but we can do it if we work together. That’s what we’re working toward every day. Join us. Go to FRC.org slash S-A-G-E-C-O-N SageCon to learn more. That’s S-A-G-E-C-O-N SageCon to learn more. Welcome back to Washington Watch. I’m Joseph Backholm sitting in for Tony. Yesterday, retail giant Walmart, the largest private employer in the country, announced plans to drop its DEI initiatives, adding itself to the growing list of popular brands that have nixed their woke policies.
SPEAKER 12 :
Like many companies all across the United States, we’ve been on a journey and we continue to be on a journey. And what we’re trying to do is to ensure that every customer, every associate feels welcome here to shop and to feel like they belong. And we’re going to continue to make the best decisions we can that makes everyone, our customers, our associates, feel like this is an environment they can shop in and thrive in.
SPEAKER 14 :
That was Walmart U.S. President and CEO John Furner speaking with CBS Mornings earlier today. The move by Walmart is being hailed as the biggest win yet for the movement to end wokeness in corporate America. but it encouraged other companies to follow suit. Joining me now to discuss this is Steve Sokup. He’s the vice president and publisher of The Political Forum and the author of The Dictatorship of Woke Capital, How Political Correctness Captured Big Business. Steve, welcome back to Washington Watch.
SPEAKER 06 :
Thank you for having me, Joseph. I appreciate it.
SPEAKER 14 :
It’s good to see you again. What’s your reaction to the latest announcement from Walmart?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, I think it’s an enormous announcement. It’s a very big deal, not just because Walmart is the largest private employer in the world and the largest retailer in the world, but also because it signals the ongoing movement toward what I think is going to be. a preference cascade in the abandonment of woke policies in various corporations in the United States. This summer, we started with a handful of corporations. Some of them, most of them connected to a conservative customer base, but it’s moved on from there. We moved, I think, by the end of the summer, Lowe’s had abandoned its DEI policies. Ford had abandoned its DEI policies. And now we get the largest company in the world by revenues doing the same. I think that’s important because it points to an ongoing trend that I think at some point becomes a very potent preference cascade.
SPEAKER 14 :
Now talk a little bit, if you would, about why you think this is happening. Is this a response to complaints from customers? Is this a response to kind of financial consequences of moving too far to the left? How do you explain these moves and specifically the one from Walmart?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, I think the term I use there, preference cascade, sort of explains it all. That’s a term that was first introduced into the American lexicon by the economist Timur Karan roughly 35 years ago, and which he used to describe the collapse in totalitarian regimes and specifically the totalitarian regimes in Eastern Europe. And essentially what it tells us is that there is this pent up, frustration among corporate executives with the way that certain education groups, certain left wing shareholder groups have ridden them over the past several years to do things that are not in line with the business and not in line with their shareholders’ best interests. They went along because they were afraid of being singled out. Just like your average citizen in the Soviet Union, you go along because you don’t want to be the only one who speaks out against the government. All of these corporations went along thinking that everybody else believed this, so we better believe it too. what happens eventually is that some spark sets off a recognition uh among these individuals or in this case companies that says you know what i’m not alone i’m not the only one who thinks that this is garbage that this is something that is harming my company that is harming my shareholders and eventually uh momentum builds uh and you end up with everybody almost simultaneously recognizing that this is a corrupt regime and it’s something that needs to be overthrown. In this case, the spark, what we’ve been missing in this movement for the last four or five years was Robbie Starbuck. Robbie got on board and Robbie decided that he wanted to carry out sort of an investigative journalism attack on some of these companies that have conservative customer bases, uh, and yet we’re embracing these liberal policies. Uh, and he really pushed them. Uh, and so once it started with, you know, tractor supply company and moved on to Harley Davidson and then moved on, uh, some other corporations, uh, it became sort of an unstoppable, uh, an unstoppable, uh, role of companies saying, you know what, we’re going to get involved in this too, because we agree with them. It turns out we’re not alone. So I think that there’s been a change in the way people understand the existing regime, the existing organizations that have forced these policies on American business.
SPEAKER 14 :
Now, the headline here is that Walmart has dropped their DEI initiatives. But what does that mean in the real world? Is this something that will manifest itself only in the HR practices of Walmart? Or is this something that customers will actually notice?
SPEAKER 06 :
To be honest with you, I don’t think it’s something that customers will notice necessarily, but it is something that shareholders will notice over the long run. And A big part of this stakeholder movement that we’ve seen over the last, I don’t know, decade to two decades in American corporations has been to focus on distant stakeholders. And I think that what we’re seeing here is a return to focusing on stakeholders. stakeholders that are closer to the corporation and that mean more directly to the corporation. In this particular case, it’s shareholders. These policies are not good for business. These policies are not good over the extended term for the way the company functions and its profitability. And so a return to standard traditional business practices is something that’s really going to benefit shareholders. And I think that they’re the ones who are going to see it most directly over the near to medium term.
SPEAKER 14 :
Do you have a sense of how this will impact Walmart’s operations? Is this merely like hiring quotas or is there more to it than that?
SPEAKER 06 :
To be honest with you, I don’t know what Walmart’s specific DEI programs were. I do know that a lot of these corporations that have announced that they are ending their DEI programs, part of what that means is that they’re ending their affiliation with the Human Rights Campaign, which is the largest and most prominent of these pressure groups that have pushed these companies towards these policies. So I think it’s important to understand that what Walmart has done what some of these other corporations, Ford, Lowe’s, Tractor Supply, et cetera, have all done, is decided that they’re no longer going to play this game with the human rights campaign, where the human rights campaign gets to determine every year whether or not they’re a… inclusive employer. So I think that’s the primary benefit that we’re going to see here is that these corporations have basically moved beyond kowtowing to the pressure groups.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah, and just to bring people up to speed who may not be aware of all the backstory of this, the Human Rights Campaign, and you described them as kind of the largest pressure organization on the left, they’ve essentially gone to these corporations over the years and said, unless you do what we want, unless you adopt all of these progressive HR policies, We’re going to accuse you of being racist. We’re going to accuse you of being anti-gay. And they changed the criteria in such a way that you had to affirmatively give them money in order to achieve a perfect score on their index. And if you didn’t have a perfect score on their index, they accused you of all sorts of terrible things trying to ruin your brand. And so it really was kind of a bully tactic, kind of a shakedown tactic, mafia style, where they’re saying it’s a nice business you have here. It’d be a shame if something happened to it. So why don’t you give us some money? So we’ll give you kind of social media protection and not destroy your reputation. Do these movements away from the HRC indicate that these kind of accusations of racism aren’t working anymore?
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, I think that they were, for the most part, they were largely false to begin with. And, you know, I think in society, we’re seeing a change of preferences in general. I think that was demonstrated in the last election. That’s demonstrated in the movement of minority groups away from the Democratic Party toward the Republican Party in this last election. I think that people are tired of the claims that racism is an issue or that homophobia is an issue based on evidence that is flimsy at best. So I think that, yeah, that means that some of these charges have lost their punch, that it’s no longer going to be enough to say, aha, they’re a racist company without having something more substantive to back it up than simply saying.
SPEAKER 14 :
You mentioned that Walmart is not the first to make this decision. Do you think that we are in the beginning of an even greater movement than what we’ve seen in corporate America, back toward neutrality, at least, rather than left-wing activism?
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, absolutely. That’s one of the reasons why I think the Walmart decision is so important is because it builds on the momentum that was started this past summer. I think that we are on the verge of a preference cascade. And I think that, you know, if we go back to the human rights campaign and the tactics that they use, it’s pretty clear that they run an authoritarian, if not totalitarian operation in the way that they pressure corporations to bend to their social will. And so I think that this is very important. And I think that the distance that these companies are putting between themselves and these policies, as well as the organizations that push these policies, is extremely important. And I think that it eventually builds enough momentum that everybody finally breathes a sigh of relief and says, look, we’ve been waiting for years to figure out a way to get out from under the thumb. of our oppressors and finally we have a way, finally we understand that we’re not alone and that everyone is in fact tired of the pressure that they’ve been putting on us, contrary to our best business interests.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah, the left has depended for quite a while on the ability to just say anyone who disagrees with us is a bad person. And it seems that corporate America and the rest of America, and we saw this in the election, I think is developing some immunity to that pressure. And it’s no longer as effective as it once was. How do you expect the left to respond?
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s an interesting question. And I think that… There are some people on the left who have responded to incidents like the corporate corporate race away from DEI as well as the election by saying, hey, look, we have gotten out of touch. The problem is that even if that were a majority of people in the Democratic Party or the majority of people on the political left, the radicals still control the institutions. The radicals control the media. The radicals control Hollywood. The radicals control education and higher education. And so there’s a distinct disadvantage for any centrists on the left who wish to dissociate themselves from the policies that have been so disastrous, both for business and for the Democratic Party, in that the institutions of cultural transmission are all controlled by the radicals. I mean, that’s a problem that we on the right have faced for a long time. And now those on the more centrist part of the left are facing it as well. So I think that there’s going to be a struggle on the left as to who’s going to control things. And if the centrist left is going to win back any power and have any effectiveness in fighting some of this stuff, they’re going to have to join with the centrist right and even the conservative right in taking back some of these institutions from the radical leftists.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah. I want to talk for a moment about another company that’s part of this broader conversation, Target, because we’ll remember they made headlines somewhat recently because they were very much a part of kind of the left-wing activism circuit. And specifically, they got attention because they were selling tuck underwear and swimsuits for children. Really kind of embracing this whole trans narrative, the boys can become girls if they want to. A lot of parents push back. Well, recently they failed to meet earnings expectations. Their stock price plummeted 20% after that report. Is this just coincidence or is Target’s kind of leadership on the left politically having a financial impact?
SPEAKER 06 :
You know, I’m not a retail analyst, and I’m not an analyst of Target in particular, so I don’t want to attribute the political pushback any greater significance than it might have actually had. You know, I’m sure there are other factors involved. At the same time, it didn’t do a whole lot for Target’s reputation. Again, this not only were they pushing products and policies that were contrary to the wishes of their customers, but they were also making it clear that they were caving into the pressure groups. I mean, with Target and Bud Light, it’s clear. It’s almost inarguable. You can draw the line from the HRC to the corporation, to their policies, to the boycotts that occurred that this is they were. in arguably doing the bidding of the pressure groups. So I think it has damaged Target’s reputation. Whether or not that’s what’s responsible for the fall in stock price, I am hesitant to say, but certainly it hasn’t helped.
SPEAKER 14 :
What’s your advice to those of us who are just consumers? We kind of watch most of this. We don’t own any corporations. We can’t direct corporate policy, but we care and we want a culture that is healthy, that’s promoting truth rather than lies, that isn’t destructive to our children. What do you encourage people to do as we observe these developments?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, I think one of the most important things people can do is watch where they invest. You know, it’s easy to say, watch where you shop and boycott Target. But some of that stuff is very difficult. You may live in a town that has only Targets and not Walmarts. It may be difficult for you to get your basic needs met without shopping at Target or without ordering from Amazon or doing, you know, engaging with some of these companies that have some bad policies. So I would encourage people to be careful about their investment. Be careful about with whom you invest. what funds you buy, what stocks you’re invested in, what companies, what their policies are, et cetera, and voice your opinions to the companies that you own. Call the investor relations office. Nobody in the investor relations office wants a stockholder calling them and complaining. It’s far more impactful to do that than to call a customer service rep. So I would encourage people to pay very close attention to where their 401k or where their IRA is invested and with whom it is invested.
SPEAKER 14 :
Steve Soukup, thank you so much for your time today.
SPEAKER 06 :
Thank you for having me, Joseph. I appreciate it.
SPEAKER 14 :
And friends, we thank you for joining us today on Washington Watch. We will be back with you tomorrow as we get ready to be very, very thankful. We’ll see you tomorrow. Until then, fear God and nothing else.
SPEAKER 10 :
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