The theme of religious freedom takes center stage as we uncover the troubling case of a California church facing restrictions after decades of beachside services. The ACLJ steps in to defend constitutional rights against discriminatory policies. Also, we tackle the geopolitical implications of U.S. direct talks with Hamas in our ongoing effort to address international crises.
SPEAKER 07 :
On today’s show, Tulsi Gabbard pulls security clearance from the deep state. 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.
SPEAKER 10 :
And now your host, Logan Sekula. Welcome to Sekula. We are taking your calls and questions and comments. 1-800-684-3110. Get your comments in the chat as well. If you’re watching on YouTube or Rumble or Facebook or wherever you’re watching us on X. If we’re back up today on X after yesterday’s big kind of cyber attack. Hopefully we are back up broadcasting live there today. So welcome to the broadcast. We do have some great news for a lot of people. I don’t know if you think it’s great. Actually, I wanted to get your thoughts on this. As our friend, former colleague Tulsi Gabbard, now director of national intelligence, made some pretty historic moves and threw a post on X last night. Posted per the president’s directive, I have revoked security clearance and barred access to classified information from Anthony Blinken, Jake Sullivan, Lisa Monaco, Mark Zay, Norman Eisen, Letitia James, Alvin Bragg, Andrew Weissman, along with the 51 signers of the Hunter Biden disinformation letter, the president’s daily press brief. or the daily presence daily brief is no longer being provided to former president Biden. So she wanted to clear up this and clearly they’re going through and they’re kind of clearing the roles, if you will.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right. So this announcement is what many had hoped for or looked for based off of those that have used their security clearance in a way that could be seen as weaponizing or politicizing that entire process. So you have the former secretary of state, Anthony Blinken, who was the architect of the 51 signers of that Hunter Biden laptop letter before he was Secretary of State. Jake Sullivan, former National Security Advisor to President Biden, deep state creature. Lisa Monaco, former Deputy Attorney General. You have Norm Eisman, who worked on the first impeachment of President Trump. For the Democrats in Congress, you have Letitia James and Alvin Bragg, obviously famous for their lawfare against President Trump in the lead up to this past election, 2024. And then you have Andrew Weissman, who was a part of the Bob Mueller team who investigated the Russia hoax in the first president’s term. And then you have the 51 signers of the Hunter Biden disinformation letter. Those were the the national security or former intelligence members of that community that said this is Russian disinformation and they leaned on their expertise as being. part of the intel community and having security clearance that you must trust us. This is Russian disinformation. We all know that that was false and it was meant to sway an election in 2020. And to some degree, it did have an effect on the way that election turned out. But I think this move by Tulsi Gabbard is also showing that The overclassification of U.S. secrets, which is something we will talk about with Rick coming up, as well as how many security clearances there are out there, give an opportunity for people to monetize their security clearance. And these people have used their credentials as having security clearances to get jobs at large defense contractors, at think tanks, or to be able to try to give credibility to a letter they put out when they’re trying to sway a voter’s mind about an election. This is holding them accountable, and many of them, it is holding them accountable fiscally with their pocketbooks by saying, you’re no longer going to use your security clearance to either interfere with our elections and or profit off of past government service.
SPEAKER 10 :
Phone lines are open for you. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. It may be unprecedented, but you feel like this is a good thing that needs to be done. Again, like I said, just go to cleaning up the list on who has security clearance. I want to hear from you. 1-800-684-3110. As Will said, Rick Grinnell is going to be joining us, former director of national intelligence. He can give us sort of a breakdown on how this all works. And again, we’re able to do that because incredible people like you support the ACLJ, support this broadcast. Because you do that, we’re able to bring on people like Rick Grinnell. We’ll also be joined later on by Jeff Balaban from ACLJ Jerusalem, as there have been some major moves in the war in Gaza, including the U.S. holding some direct talks with Hamas. They are doing that now to try to get the hostages free. What do you think about that, having to have conversations with these organizations like Hamas? I know it’s pretty controversial. 1-800-684-3110. Make your donation today. All donations are matched. Welcome back to Sekulow. We do have some phone lines open for you at 1-800-684-31-Tennessee. A lot of great feedback right now for Tulsi Gabbard’s decision to pull security clearances from some of those top Biden names. Again, it’s not necessarily that crazy, but it is a bit different this early in an administration to see these kind of things happen. But… It’s the decision of the president. It’s the decision of the administration on who gets to be or gets to have these security clearances, who gets to be briefed. And in this moment right now, they feel like because of the situation that happened with Hunter Biden and in the disinformation letter, that these are not people that should be trusted with our national secrets. And I think that’s what people voted for.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, and I think what’s rich is this is from NBC News, because obviously the left is going to be outraged at this. How dare he? And there’s got to be a stark contrast for people to realize there’s a difference between what’s the law and allowed and what is norm and tradition. The president’s allowed to do this. Other presidents could have done this. But we have this this. fake idea of that every president has to be bound by specific tradition and not use some of their authority that they’re allowed to do just because it’s the person before you didn’t do it and i think that can be seen throughout the entirety of this administration that is what people voted for They were tired of the same old, same old. And so now you’re seeing a president that is willing to be like, listen, these people weaponized their security clearance and their credentials against a political opponent. But this is how NBC News decided to phrase it. The decision is the latest example of the Trump administration’s unprecedented use of security clearances to go after perceived political opponents. But what they didn’t also say is that this is a direct response to 51 signers of the Hunter Biden disinformation letter. That in an unprecedented use of security clearance went after perceived political opponents. It’s this works both ways.
SPEAKER 10 :
I mean, you have names like Anthony Blinken, Jake Sullivan, Letitia James, Alvin Bragg. These are Andrew Wiseman. These are not names that are unfamiliar. To people who follow this broadcast, follow the news, what’s going on, I think there’s a pretty easy to jump to understanding. And she even says, along with the other 51 signers of the Hunter Biden disinformation letter. So specifically aiming at that. And of course, she said that the president’s daily brief is no longer being provided to former President Biden. Probably something that people didn’t realize even still would have been happening once someone leaves office.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, in many times, a former president, especially if they are younger, maybe more active, a lot of times that briefing is still given to a former president because a president will sometimes call the former president and seek advice. many presidents have done that uh i know that george w bush did give some advice to president obama at times uh one that was famous for people not wanting his advice was the late jimmy carter he actually got those briefings and tried to weigh in he would call the white house and try to give advice and uh it was not well received by not just the reagan administration The Bush administration, the Clinton administration, the Obama administration. But that is something that does traditionally happen because they say it’s the loneliest job in the world being president and it’s an exclusive club that sometimes you are facing decisions, especially about national security, that only a handful of living people understand. have ever faced and so there is that kind of camaraderie historically not with this president and it’s nothing in the constitution or law that says you have to be good buddies with the your predecessor right it may be standard practice maybe what’s happening but it’s not
SPEAKER 10 :
something legally that has to continue we are going to shift focus a little bit but don’t worry we’re going to get right back to this topic so stay tuned give us a call still if you want to talk about it i want to hear from you 1-800-684-3110 or get your comments in on youtube or rumble and make sure you’re subscribing to our youtube channel or however you get us make sure you’re following along but i wanted to shift a little bit well to some work the aclj is doing i saw this you know come across yesterday and thought we got to make sure we talk about this on the air because these are the situations where the ACLJ gets involved. You may hear about us in Washington, D.C., and think, OK, these guys, they’ve represented presidents of the United States with their legal battles. But we’re also talking about churches that are meeting in California on the beach. They’ve been doing it for decades. And, of course, are running into some trouble right now. And CeCe Heil is joining us right now. And CeCe, you filed in this or submitted in this. And we wanted to kind of get a bit of a backstory and history of this specific instance. Because people are seeing it on social media. They’re starting to see this story pop up. And it is an ACLJ case.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, you know, I think sometimes we forget that religious discrimination still happens in the United States. And this is a case in California in Redondo Beach. There has been a church that has met on the beach public forum for 18 years. And just this year, the church receives notice when they’re filling out their annual permit that they get notice from the Los Angeles Department of Beaches and Harbors that, oh, guess what? This year, the department has decided that they’re going to limit groups that have religious activities. So only groups that take on religious activities, they’re going to be limited to only six permits a year, not the annual permit like they used to have every weekend they would have service there. They are only limited that now they can only have six services per year. And again, this policy only applies to religious services, which is completely unconstitutional.
SPEAKER 10 :
I have a lot of friends in California, and this is not uncommon that a church would be held outside or in a public park or on a beach because, well, you have the weather really on your side for most of the time of the year. So, of course, instead of having to have a building or having to have any of that, and it’s a great outreach tool. But there are moments where they get shut down and this happens and the ACLJ can get involved. And look, this is someone we believe just came through our website, reached out and said, hey, I’m having problems. You may hear us talk about that all the time on ACLJ.org slash help and wonder, does that even happen? Do people do it? They do it every day. And there are moments like this where we get to get involved and really represent, because when you look at it, this is purely religious discrimination. It’s not even close.
SPEAKER 08 :
And Logan, I think one point here is that, is there a coincidence that it happened this year after 18 years? It’s what we’ve warned you about, is that these localities that have a lot of power, are going to push back against a christian and conservative swing in the national body politic and you’re going to see things like this where there’s no problem for 18 years but then all of a sudden it’s not everybody it’s not like we’re limiting this and those the the places that you can get that permit it also there’s only four locations now not even the one that they had been at and it shows a lot of things it shows a misunderstanding of ministry by these city officials and that they are specifically wanting to target a church one of our rumble ranters comfort has actually attended this church she said wow that’s great church on the beach we’ve learned the church on the beach yeah for sure you’ve seen you’ve probably seen them what’s interesting though with this one in particular
SPEAKER 10 :
is these were not people causing problems right these were not distraction right you know you could say how i could see how a police officer and a a pro-life you know activist on the street corner with bullhorn how they could have some tension yeah but this is a church service been held for 19 years they’ve been accommodating in the past if hey we need to use the beach this week for like you said a 5k or something like that no problems this is not uh anything that they’re having issues with But of course, because it is religious, or in this case, a Christian moment that’s happening every week, we’re going to figure out not how to shut it down completely, but to essentially shut down your church when it is church on the beach.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, and it’s funny because over the phone, our client was told that the county views churches as not needing the beach anymore. Because churches can meet in a building. Well, here’s the problem with that is that’s not what the Constitution requires. It’s unlawful to treat religious groups differently than non-religious groups with regard to access to public forums. It doesn’t have anything. It says they could meet in a building. On the phone, our client was literally told that, that, hey, we’ve decided that churches don’t need access. access to the beach because they can actually meet in a building so that is where you just have misinformation disinformation and we’re hopeful we sent off a demand letter we’ve given them a time to respond if they don’t we will pursue this in court because this is an absolute on its face unconstitutional change to this permit you wonder some of the times who these people are that make these statements like well they could meet in a building
SPEAKER 10 :
So therefore, they don’t need the beach. They don’t need public land.
SPEAKER 08 :
But you’re glad they say these things. Because then, CeCe, you send the demand letter. And because of all of you that support the ACLJ, we’re able to do this for this church at no cost. That’s right. They get a very strong legal team. They get CeCe Hiles signing the letter going out. But if they don’t respond, now we have some backup. If we have to take this to court, it’s like… Here’s exactly how it’s discrimination.
SPEAKER 05 :
Right, absolutely. That statement is golden because we can say, look, this is just a misconception. Clearly, let’s just try to fix it. Let’s fix it. Quickly fix it.
SPEAKER 10 :
I mean, I’m looking at one of the comments. One guy said, hey, I was baptized at Pirates Cove for Calvary Chapel. Like, think about that when there’s thousands. How many thousands of people have you seen do that? Of course, if they come in and go, you know what, guys? You’ve been doing this for decades, but I don’t think so because it’s religious. How would you feel about that? Give us a call. I’d love to hear from you. 1-800-684-3110. In the next segment, Rick Vanell is going to be joining us. We’re going to talk a bit more about those security clearances. And hey, he’s a California guy. He’ll probably have to weigh in on this topic as well. But I want to encourage you to support the work of the ACLJ. We’re not able to take on cases like that church on the beach without people like you. Because we’re able to do that for them at zero cost. You can’t do that. You can’t have the best and the brightest without the funds to do it. So I encourage you right now, make your donation at ACLJ.org. Welcome back to Seculo. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. We are kind of heading back. Though the last segment, we spent a lot of time in California. Now we’re going to go to our friend Rick Grinnell, who always is joining us and a proud Californian. But we were talking about a church in California meets on the beach. It’s currently being restricted after 19 years. of serving there on the beach in Redondo Beach and now being told, hey, you only can do that five or six times a year. We’re going to limit it just because it’s religious speech and the ACLJ is getting involved. But we’re going to get involved. We’re going to take care of that for that church. But for you, Rick, I want to get your opinion on the news this morning or last night that broke from Tulsi Gabbard, who is current director of national intelligence. You, of course, are a former director of national intelligence saying, hey, we’ve revoked security clearances for a some of your favorites, Rick, Alvin Bragg, Letitia James, and saying, you know what? It’s time for these security clearances to end and time to quit briefing these people, specifically if they were involved in things like the Hunter Biden disinformation letter. Now, of course, the left is crying, hey, this is unprecedented. This isn’t what we do here. But I wanted to get your feedback and thoughts on this and sort of the move from the Trump administration to not be afraid to break those, I guess, political norms.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, first of all, let me just say that Beach Church is so important in Southern California. So thank you for getting involved. It’s an amazing idea. It works. And, you know, the beaches are public access. So there should be no reason why people can’t gather on a Sunday and praise and worship and hear someone speak. It’s what we do on the beach is socialize with people in our community. So thank you for getting involved. ACLJ is always at the forefront, and I love it. the beach that’s right next to me. So that’s great. Look, when it comes to what Tulsi’s doing, I think this is just another common sense approach to being accountable to the people. The people were outraged that this group abused their access to classified information by pretending that something was true when they knew it wasn’t. And let me be specific. Most of these individuals never had a briefing on the Hunter Biden laptop and whether or not the Intel services thought it was misinformation or Russian information. There was never a briefing on that. There was never any raw intelligence pointing to that. This was a political calculation by these individuals and their political calculations were wrapped in their access to classified information. They say things like, oh, I can’t tell you, but trust me because I have access to classified information. They abused their position by getting involved in politics and pretending that they knew something. There are a couple of other people that do that regularly. Adam Schiff is one of them. And I think that it’s important to hold these people to account. If you’re going to have access to classified information, don’t go into the public sphere and pretend something is true when it’s not. Don’t abuse your positions. They did. And Tulsi Gabbard is holding them to account and taking away that access to classified information.
SPEAKER 08 :
Rick, one question I’m seeing on both Rumble and on YouTube that are coming here, and I think it speaks to a broader issue, one that you’ve addressed on this broadcast many times with the over-classification of information. But people are asking, why would someone like Letitia James and Alvin Bragg, who aren’t federal employees, they’re within the state of New York, why would they have a security clearance? And so I think that, one, people just need to kind of know how this process works and Maybe how many security clearances are actually out there?
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, first of all, the security clearance process is abused and too many people pretend like they have full access. I can guarantee you that Letitia James only had compartmentalized information. She was probably restricted on what would relate to her job and probably through terrorism and terrorist threats. And I could make the case that prosecutors need to have access about the threats around them. But they certainly don’t need access to the president’s daily briefing and to have access to information that we know that they would then abuse. And that’s the issue here. When you abuse your position and pretend like you know something that you don’t, then I think you should have your clearance taken away and you should suffer the consequences of not having access to appropriate information. I will say, though, when prosecutors abuse this process, it’s really indicative of who they are. And you have to wonder, what else are they abusing with the power that they have?
SPEAKER 10 :
is there a need also for people like this to have this kind of clearance post administration? I think there’s probably a lot of our audience and I see in the comments going, I didn’t even understand. I thought, you know, the day the administration changed over, you know, it changed over. I mean, but there are some needs occasionally for people to retain their clearances or to, you know, not have to go through this process again. But again, if you’ve done something that clearly the American people are voting against, then that should be taken care of. But what about the instances where, again, just to sort of inform our audience why that even happens?
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, first of all, a lot of former government officials are good people and they’re trying to help the U.S. government in ways that they can be helpful. We want a bipartisan approach to some of these issues. Let me just give you an example. When I negotiated the Kosovo-Serbia deal in the Trump administration, It was a very good deal negotiated by both parties in the Oval Office, and it was really gonna move the Balkans forward. When I left and when President Trump left the first administration and Joe Biden took over, his White House did an evaluation. They asked me to brief them on the situation in the Balkans. I briefed them. They did an evaluation and they decided that they were going to use this agreement and this policy as official US government policy under Joe Biden. They embraced the Trump work that we did. Now they didn’t call it the same thing that instead of the Trump agreement, they called it the Washington agreement, which was fine. But there were times when in the Balkans during the Biden administration, that violence was breaking out. There was the situation where there were hostages taking, people don’t like it when I use that word, but I think it’s an appropriate word People were taken, law enforcement officials in the northern part of Kosovo, and it was not a good thing. And they needed someone to go and try to resolve this. They recognized, the Biden team recognized that I had credibility there. So I went to the northern part of Kosovo, I briefed the Biden team, I briefed the White House. I had access to classified information because I was helping them in that situation. They recognized that I could do good work there. And so there are times when the current administration wants to utilize some players. I can think of Bill Richardson. Remember, Bill Richardson was used on the outside numerous times to negotiate for the release of hostages, whether it was in North Korea or And multiple administrations used Bill Richardson because he had credibility. We need to get back to that point where you can utilize back channels or other people to further your U.S. policy, to further the policy. But when these individuals abuse their positions, that’s when they should be cut off. And that’s exactly what…
SPEAKER 10 :
joining us today I appreciate it I really wanted to know that and I think our audience is well off now knowing better off knowing why this even happens I think we can get lost in the headline and not understand the situations but we have great people like you on our team to help explain all that and I appreciate it we got a second half hour coming up on Seculo go to ACLJ.org right now we only got a one minute break but it’s a perfect time to make a donation during our life and liberty drive do it right now all donations are doubled right now and again if you don’t get the full hour join us on ACLJ.org or social media
SPEAKER 07 :
keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 10 :
Welcome back to Sekulow’s second half hour of the broadcast. If you missed the first half, join us later on. You can catch the replay of this at any time. on ACLJ.org, on the ACLJ app, on YouTube, on Rumble, Facebook. You can find us always there. So if you don’t get the full hour, if you weren’t able to hear it live while we’re doing it, you can always go back and do it. Of course, you can also watch us live each and every day on the Salem News Channel, which is available on Pluto TV, Samsung Plus, a lot of great options. Of course, the Salem News Channel website as well, where you have to see a pretty stacked lineup of hosts that are on that network. So we appreciate you all joining us from all the different realms, if you will. We are keeping the discussion going, and we’re going to be joined in the next segment by Jeff Balaban. Jeff is the head of ACLJ Jerusalem. We’re going to give you an update of what’s going on in Israel, including the U.S. having talks. with Hamas, direct talks. It’s going to happen in Qatar about the release of the hostages and ending the war. So I’d love to hear from you, your thoughts on this. Look, this is President Trump’s way of doing it. I think sometimes when you hear about negotiating with people like Hamas and organizations like Hamas, you can have a bit of an uneasy feeling. But again, he did this with Kim Jong-un. He’s done this with other leaders that are not necessarily the most savory and sometimes with great results. So it’s tough. Part of me doesn’t like it.
SPEAKER 08 :
Part of me totally understands why you’d try. That’s right, Logan. And it’s historically been the case that the policy of the United States is we don’t negotiate with terrorists. What you see here is a break from the norm. It’s very similar to what we talked about with the security clearances, is that it’s a break from the norm and tradition of people maintaining their security clearance after they leave government service. But that doesn’t mean… It’s against the law. It doesn’t mean that it’s against the Constitution. It’s just the way that things have been done. And when you see sometimes that no results were gotten by the Biden administration of getting Americans home, and specifically, there is one Israeli American still believed to be alive in captivity of Hamas. There are four people. unfortunately, bodies that are controlled by Hamas right now of hostages that were killed as a result of Hamas’s actions on October 7th. And if the previous administration had zero movement on getting an American home and the remains of Americans home so their families can have proper burial and mourning, then maybe you do something different. And I don’t know if it sets a policy for every terrorist organization or if it sets a different change going forward. But you at least have to give credit where credit’s due, that when the same tired ideas aren’t working, are getting you nowhere, if you’re the most powerful country in the world, Maybe you should try something different.
SPEAKER 10 :
We’re going to continue that conversation coming up in the next segment with Jeff Balaban from ACLJ Jerusalem. We’re also going to continue to take your calls. If you’re on hold right now, stay on hold. We will get to you. Call us at 1-800-684-3110. We’re continuing the conversation also about Tulsi Gabbard revoking the security clearances of some of those top deep state names, if you will, sort of the classic names from the Biden administration, including Letitia James, Alvin Bragg, Anthony Blinken, all of those names that you probably don’t want Jake Sullivan, you don’t want to hear again. But here we are hearing them again. But of course, maybe this is for better reasons. We only got a minute left in this segment. I just want to encourage you right now. I haven’t done a big pitch today, and here it is. I want you to support the work of the ACLJ. You heard about what we’re doing for that church on the beach in California. You’ve heard about what we’re doing now in Israel. You’ve heard from Rick Grinnell, former director of national intelligence. You’ve heard from Will and I for the last 40 minutes or so. But I need your support. We don’t just protect life, liberty, and faith here. We do it around the world. It’s not just here in the US. So that’s where we’re gonna go to Israel in the next segment. We have offices from Tennessee to Washington, DC, Virginia, Jerusalem, Strasbourg, France, Pakistan, all over the world, the ACLJ is there. We’re at the Supreme Court, we’re at the UN, we’re at the International Criminal Court. We can’t do that without your support. We’re in court today. As we speak, there are cases happening right now. So do it right now. Go to ACLJ.org because all donations are doubled right now. So if you give $10, there’s another person who said, I will unlock $10. If you give $1,000, there’s a person saying, I will unlock $1,000. So do it right now. to secular we are going to take your calls in the next segment at 1-800-684-3110 we got three lines open right now so stay on hold if you’re on hold or give us a call if you’d like to chat jeff balaban’s joining us right now head of aclj jerusalem there have been some updates jeff in uh the war in gaza one of which though is that the u.s has been pretty much said they’re with Hamas on the hostage situation. They were doing that in Qatar. Mixed feelings, I think, for a lot of people when you start talking about having diplomatic meetings with Hamas. I wanted to get your feedback because, look, I mean, maybe it’s that we’re trying something different here. We’re actually trying to see how we can finish this, progress, and get the rest of the hostages released and their remains released for those who are no longer with us. But I wanted to get your thoughts on this strategy of meeting potentially, not even potentially meeting with Hamas to hold these direct talks.
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, there is a lot of confusion here, and there were certainly voices here expressing alarm and concern about a U.S. negotiator dealing directly with Hamas. There does seem to be a step back, meaning that they said this was a one-off trying to negotiate. However, Marco Rubio, Secretary of State, said it was worth trying. And here’s the thing. You know, Israel generally does trust President Trump. And I think that President Trump seems to be maintaining a very tight ship and people, you know, if they’re drifting from what he intends, you know, there will be a change. And that said, look, none of this is pleasant. This is all very painful. And I think it really depends on the nature of the conversations. The notion of negotiating with Hamas or indeed with any Palestinian leadership group, they are all terrorists. I mean, every one of them is no exception to this, is… I wouldn’t say it’s tasteless. I think it’s unsavory. It’s unlikely to ever succeed. And many times it’s immoral. But sometimes when those negotiations are actually threats, that’s actually necessary and good. So I think that if it’s a negotiation pleading and asking for things, well, I don’t think it’s Donald Trump’s way. And I hope it’s not his administration’s way. And no one here really thinks it is. But no one should be at all confused about this. No one is suggesting, at least no one believes at the highest levels of the Trump administration, that the people in Hamas, as far as we can tell, are people you can actually do deals with because they’re reasonable people. This is all about a terrible, terrible crisis of hostages, really brutal and emotional and painful, including Americans, obviously. And so Donald Trump and his people are trying everything. There are those who have grave concerns, those who are cheering it on. But overall, as I say, they said it’s a one-off. And bottom line, it is my hope and I believe that if it’s coming from the top down, this is more in the nation of ultimatum and threat rather than pleading and negotiating.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, and Jeff, I think that’s a very good point, especially the way even U.S. media is categorizing it. New York Times is saying they hold direct talks. That’s a very specific word instead of negotiations. When you read President Trump’s truth social posts, Those aren’t negotiating words. Those are demands. So once again, I defer to you as well that we have seen the talk from President Trump. We know how he has dealt with places like North Korea and has secured the release of Americans from places like North Korea in the first term, from Russia in this term. And in those situations, it didn’t seem like the U.S. gave up anything directly. to the the foreign power or the adversary so i do think that is a very good point people should look at is even the way it’s being reported is that the special envoy adam bowler was holding direct talks and engaging this group that is very different than it being reported as negotiations over a hostage
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, I would actually, I think that’s a very valid point, William. And I also would add that if you look at the top officials in this, and obviously Donald Trump is the top official, but if you look at his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, you look at, you know, who he’s having as ambassador, Mike Huckabee, there is no question that every one of them understands that Hamas is pure evil. And more than that, Donald Trump himself in the last few days has gone on record talking about not just Hamas, which is one particular head of you know, of these, this multi-headed snake. He’s talked about the Palestinian, the entire Palestinian culture as being one that really cannot continue because it is a culture, a culture that grooms generations to be an anti-Semitic genocidal death cult, and it must stop. And so he’s not limiting it as many people have as most people do. Say the problem is Hamas, we don’t want to deal with the real issue. He has openly dealt and morally and truly with clarity dealt with the fact that it is the entire Palestinian enterprise that has raised generations of children to be, I’m sorry, monsters. People whose greatest wish in life is to kill Jews. And it’s got to stop. And Trump’s been very clear about that. So I think someone who understands that. is not really about to give Hamas, one particularly evil head of that snake that people know about, much benefit of any doubt and indeed will be more making ultimata than asking for favors.
SPEAKER 10 :
And you saw that as he posted sort of the final warning last week in the sort of moment where now we don’t know what that resulted in or may result in now moving forward. Obviously, they look like they’re going to hold some sort of direct talks. But you have that moment also where President Trump, he can be an emotional guy in the sense of reacting how a lot of us have reacted, which was he met with the hostages. When you hear the stories from the people that were actually living it, who had to go through it and are still going through it or just recently released, your mood shifts pretty dramatically from one of trying to reason with war and how this works to just wanting to go in and finish the job, if you will.
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s a good point. And I think that some of the criticism, because there was alarm, really, more people who trust Donald Trump. But some of the criticism from some of the voices that you heard here is because no one here needs to be reminded of that. Everyone here lives with that raw emotional reality every moment of every day since October 7th. And so if people are alarmed, you have to factor that in. But again, I think there’s a great deal of trust. I was actually… in meetings today at the Foreign Ministry, discussing the moves that America’s making, and again, playing our role here often, which is understanding both sides of the equation and trying to help each side really understand with more clarity what the other side is perceiving. Israel and America, incredibly close allies, incredibly close cultural similarities. Nonetheless, different nations in dramatically different settings. And so to help bridge that gap and understand is precisely what ACLJ Jerusalem exists to do.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, I’m excited that you’re able to keep that going and really build upon that. Now, one of the things over the weekend, and I mentioned it yesterday, I got a lot of feedback from it, is this push, it feels like, pretty recently. I mean, it’s been happening, it’s been bubbling up for a while, but I feel like over the weekend, it really exploded from a lot of conservative influencers. who have decided that Israel is no longer one of their issues, that they are no longer supportive, they are no longer on the side of Israel. And some of these are pretty prominent names. I don’t want to give them any more clout than they already have. But you’re not talking about people who our audience wouldn’t be familiar with. There has been this sort of tide turn on social media that really concerns me because at least we had that. At least there was for the Jewish people. And it really is very anti-Semitic rhetoric. It’s tying everything back to Jeffrey Epstein. It’s tying everything back to conspiracy theories. And it’s coming from prominent conservative names. Now they’ve become a little more fringe, but it’s a concerning thing to me. I’m going through my feed and really starting to, I mean, it kind of gave me a little bit of a panic. It’s like, okay, well now if you start losing both sides, this is where it gets nerve wracking. We got to be able to figure out how to combat that with the truth.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, look, there’s been this bubbling up for quite a while, and I will give you two specific reasons for it. One is, you know, Logan, almost better than anybody that we bring on to talk about things, that the social media itself, if your economics is on social media, which is, it depends on clicks and likes, et cetera, et cetera, and how many followers you have. Well, unfortunately, the algorithms dictate that you will do better by being an enemy of the Jews and by being their friends. It’s just a fact that there are more people out there in the world who support genocide against the Jews, and they’re there for economic interests, and it has nothing to do with telling the truth. That’s just one reality. More than that, by the way, there’s actually lots of studies now about how, because of AI, there’s so much going into sort of exponentially growing that’s still in the anti-Semitism because of the machine learning is being warped by people intentionally doing this. But the other reality is that there is, America’s going through its own cultural and faith war right now, I would say on the Christian side, which is to say that those who say, well, America was founded by white European Christian males and everyone else is an outsider and our enemy. Well, you know, that’s not true. Actually, America was founded by people who were running from that mentality, came to America from those countries which called themselves Christian, but many of them were fighting against each other and killing each other for centuries. And they came running here for religious liberties, for religious freedoms, exactly what we represent because they’re embodied in our constitution. And so there seems to be an internal war now on what’s called the conservative side, by people who want to just use Christianity or conservatism or rhetoric to cover up a very different agenda. And it’s a very hostile agenda, not just to Jews, but to America’s very Judeo-Christian founding, to the very values that come from the Bible. And we are seeing that now. And I will tell you that I believe this is going to happen more and more over the next few months. I also think that Donald Trump himself has great moral clarity on these particular issues. And there’s going to come a time if a choice has to be made,
SPEAKER 10 :
Thank you so much for joining us, Jeff. Again, Jeff Balaban, head of ACLJ Jerusalem. Support the work of ACLJ, which supports the work of ACLJ Jerusalem, the ECLJ, all of our worldwide efforts at ACLJ.org during our Life and Liberty Drive. We’ve got three lines open right now. I want to hear from you. 1-800-684-3110. 1-800-684-3110. I’d love to hear from you. Call in right now and donate if you can. Welcome back to Secular. Time to take your phone calls. We still have time to get a few more up. So 1-800-684-3110, 1-800-684-3110. Let’s go to Paul who’s calling in Washington on line two, who is watching on Rebel. Oh, someone just dropped. I think we accidentally dropped somebody on line one. If you are that person, call right back. We’ll get you up to your hold for like half an hour. Sorry. Paul from Washington, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, hi. I was wondering about the security clearance. You know, for high-ranking government officials like the secretaries and the people that are in the security spaces, why would they maintain their same security clearance once leaving service? I was in the military. You get a security clearance. Once you leave that job, that security clearance is gone. You’d have to re-get it.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, you could definitely go back, and we talked about this with Rick, and he gave us pretty good ideas of why sometimes it’s good to have a will.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, and sometimes they have to re-up the security clearance. It doesn’t mean it’s just a blanket forever, but security clearances are available to people outside of the government. But yes, Paul- many people do monetize it. Maybe they’re working for a defense contractor or a think tank or many other places where it’s valuable to have that security clearance. If you’re working for Lockheed or one of these other defense contractors that’s making sensitive weapons for the government, Many of those people working on that have to have a security clearance to even be able to do the work they do. But as Rick pointed out, and I encourage everyone, if you missed the segment with Rick, it’s about 20 minutes into this broadcast. If you’re watching it after the fact, go to that because Rick lays it out of there are many times it is useful to have people outside of the current government with that, even how he used it. at the request of the White House during the Biden administration. Someone who publicly the Biden administration, many of those people, Jake Sullivan in the lot would say that Rick Grinnell was terrible person. He was bad for the country. He was radical, but they would use him. to do their bidding when they needed someone who was trustworthy, smart, knows the issues to do negotiations in places like Kosovo and Serbia. So sometimes don’t believe everything you read in the headlines because they know that someone is smart, capable and competent like Rick Rinaldi.
SPEAKER 10 :
lot of times it’s just politics it’s just show that’s what happens in washington dc it’s why i honestly have a distaste for a lot of it is because a lot of it is professional wrestling a lot of it is showing you something but in reality we know what’s going on backstage and it’s uh unfortunate truth that happens in washington i say the trump administration uh bucks those norms so sometimes it’s not as as the fact that the president is a member of the wwe hall of fame sometimes i feel like his uh His speeches and the stuff he says is actually less pro wrestling because he’ll shoot straight. He’ll tell you what’s going on. He’ll go against the norms. In Washington, D.C., for decades, it was always about just sticking to the task. Nothing actually ever gets done. Campaign promises are never made, are never actually accomplished. And it was like, okay. as part of the normal deal that we were supposed to deal with. But I think the Trump administration changed a lot of that. Let’s continue on. Debra’s calling in Pennsylvania on Line 3. She’s watching on ACLJ.org, which is a great place, easy place to watch. Of course, it’s a great place to support the work. Debra, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thank you. I wanted to make a comment on the revoking of the security clearances. And Will mentioned something about the precedent. Joe Biden took all of the briefing… away from Donald Trump four years ago when he came into office.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s right, Debra. You actually are correct that this precedent wasn’t a norm broken by President Trump. This was actually Joe Biden set that precedent, you’re right, in 2021 early when he took office. And we actually have a flashback bite from that when Joe Biden was on with Norah O’Donnell talking about why he didn’t believe that President Trump should have it anymore. Let’s go ahead and roll bite four.
SPEAKER 06 :
still receive intelligence briefings? I think not. Why not?
SPEAKER 11 :
Because of his erratic behavior unrelated to the insurrection.
SPEAKER 06 :
I mean, you’ve called him an existential threat. You’ve called him dangerous. You’ve called him reckless.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, I have. And I believe it.
SPEAKER 06 :
What’s your worst fear if he continues to get these intelligence briefings?
SPEAKER 11 :
I’d rather not speculate out loud. I just think that there is no need for him to have that intelligence briefing. What value is giving him an intelligence briefing? What impact does he have at all other than the fact he might slip and say something?
SPEAKER 10 :
I just want to say something also. This was 2021, very early in the Biden administration. And you didn’t think after hearing that, that maybe the guy wasn’t going to be able to run three years later? It was radical behavior unrelated to insurrection. I mean, just was already having it. I mean, I don’t want to belabor it, but I look back on what the Democrats did and did to Joe Biden. It’s absurd when you look at these throwback clips that we were all supposed to just accept that he was doing okay. This was a few months into his presidency. This was now at this point four years ago. But you know what? The American people voted and the Democrats are to blame for that. When I look at those kind of things, like no wonder it went the way it went.
SPEAKER 08 :
And I do want to key in on one thing he did say pretty clearly that I think is the exact reason why Joe Biden is no longer getting an intelligence briefing is he said, I just think that there’s no need for him to have that. The intelligence briefing. What value is giving him an intelligence briefing? That is the reason. What value is giving Joe Biden an intelligence briefing at this point, knowing what we know and knowing the people around him, how they weaponize intelligence all the time? What’s the value? There’s your reason right there. No more for the former president.
SPEAKER 10 :
All right, let’s continue on. One more call, at least for the day. Ronald’s calling in South Carolina, watching on Rumble. You’re on the air.
SPEAKER 01 :
Yeah, thanks for taking my call. Yes, one thing about the good thing that Tulsi Gabbard did in revoking some of these security clearances, because I think, for one thing, you may actually have double agents working in the government. And one of the references is for after the Obama administration, when Trump was in office, how he was having these sanctions against Iran, and yet there are those of the Obama administration who’s working behind the scenes in trying to make another deal with Iran while he’s the sitting president.
SPEAKER 10 :
Ronald, we saw that even with the statements that came out after the firings, the initial firings from Doge, when that was all starting to take care of it. What happens to those double agents who now will go and give our national secrets away? You fired them, and now they’re going to go take it to China or to Russia. And you go, well, they’re the wrong people for the job. Right. It’s the same thing of, tell us five things you did this week, and no. No. Well, why not? Because you’re the wrong person for the job. I think what Elon said in that moment was just to make sure these people were even real people. Right. Because a lot of them were not. All right, that’s going to do it for the show today. I’m going to take this last minute again to tell you to support the Life and Liberty Drive. I did not have as much time on the air to do it today as I did yesterday, so understand. We require a large team here. We got the best in class attorneys, government affairs experts, entire media team in this facility that brings you this program and a stream of continual, new, unique content for our website, for social media feeds. It takes a lot to keep our teams running financially, whether that’s our studios worldwide or our offices. I was in December back at our ECLJ offices, European Center, which is doing amazing work. And we got to focus and show you guys some of that if you’re interested. If you’re more interested in what we’re doing worldwide, there’s a lot of great resources on our website. But let me know in the chat, too. Do you like hearing about the work of the ACLJ worldwide, the ECLJ, the ACLJ Jerusalem? Let me know. We have a lot of cases going on right now. We’re in court today defending a group of Christians criminally charged for carrying a cross along a roadside. Today, we’re also firing federal appeals court to allow Doge to eliminate some federal DEI programs. Tomorrow, we’re going to file at the Supreme Court to defend religious liberty in a major school choice case and so much more. And that’s just what’s happening today and tomorrow. So much more is happening. We’ll be back on the show tomorrow. But scan that QR code. Go to ACLJ.org. Donations are matched.
