BREAKING: Big Supreme Court Win

Breaking news today on Sekulow, a big win at the U.S. Supreme Court. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. The opinion just handed down a moment ago, a ruling on school choice and religious freedom that directly applied to a school in the state of Maine. We want to hear from you.

Share and post your comments. Recall 1-800-684-3110. The court has just ruled that the program which banned those funds from going to religious schools actually violates the Constitution, meaning those vouchers can be used at private schools that have a religious core to them. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow.

All right, welcome to Sekulow. And we'll take your phone calls if you've got questions and comments about this at 1-800-684-3110. We have done a lot of work on school choice at the American Center for Law and Justice. And one of the big barriers to school choice that's been in the states for decades has been this issue of if we have a school choice program that allows parents to decide to send their kids, whether it's a voucher or tax credit, to a private school, can it also go to a private religious school? Going so far as to say, can it go to a private religious school?

But what about the religious class and issues like that? Well, the Supreme Court has really clarified now for the second or third time there were a series of cases. This one originated out of Maine. And again, this is Carson v. Macon, six to three out of the U.S. Supreme Court. The opinion was written by Chief Justice John Roberts. And it says very clearly, if you are going to have programs that allow parents to choose to use the money to send their children to a private school, you cannot exclude religious schools from that parental choice. So a huge win because it opens the door not just in Maine, but again, clarifies from the Supreme Court. This is the second time in just a few years, the Supreme Court has again clarified that when you do these programs, you can't exclude religious schools.

Well, what's interesting about this is Maine had a situation where they did not have secondary schools in a lot of the rural communities, which is a large part of Maine. So what they did was they gave an option of tuition assistance, but they said the school had to be non-sectarian. And as you said, Jordan, 6th Justice of the Supreme Court said that violates, what's interesting here is the free exercise clause. It's not a speech case. It wasn't an establishment clause case. It was the right to free exercise of religion. And the court said, as we've explained in other opinions, interest in separating church and state more fiercely than the federal constitution cannot qualify as compelling in the face of an infringement of free exercise. So this case elevated the free exercise clause of the constitution.

That's good. It also says that you cannot target religious institutions for exclusion from otherwise available programs. It noted that the state need not subsidize private education and nothing requires a state to provide for subsidies for private schools. But once a state decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious.

Now we've been arguing that for a long time. It was a case I had Locke v. Davey where the court ruled against us. That case has now been severely narrowed, almost narrowed out of existence, basically overturned in the way that they're now interpreting it. So what you've got is a big win for parents, and this has been a big issue for us, in parental choice and education. Again, make sure that when states are crafting school choice laws, they have great, now solid Supreme Court precedent about making sure that they can include the full plenipia of schools. And again, remember, none of this is states saying, we're going to send money to Christian schools.

We're going to decide to do that. The parent makes the initial choice. I think that's very important here, and that's why it's about the free exercise clause, the violation of the free exercise. This is about the parental choice. No one forces states to have school choice programs. We certainly support them at the ACLJ. In Maine, it was a necessity because there were just not enough schools in some of these rural areas that were close by, and yet they still were trying to exclude parents from being able to make the choice to send their kids to religious schools.

But that may have been the school that was the closest school to them, that had the least amount of travel time. It made the most sense, and the Supreme Court, six to three, said no. Now, the liberal justices, they're not happy about this.

We get back to the break. You hear some of their absurd statements, but they just don't love the fact that the free exercise clause in the First Amendment is meaning something again at the U.S. Supreme Court. We'll take your phone calls, your comments, 1-800-684-3110.

All right, welcome back to Secula. So again, in a big victory, some will say it's a religious liberty victory. Some will say it's really a victory for school choice because ultimately it's about parents deciding where they want to send their kids to go. So we know that these programs are popping up all over the country. Some states have had them for a long time.

Other states are just starting to tinker with how to set them up. But what they're always looking to is not having a constitutional crisis by setting up these school choice programs. So the Supreme Court hasn't been clarified for the second time in two years. First, we saw it out of Montana, now Maine, that if you set up these school choice programs, you cannot exclude religious schools from the schools that parents can choose from. Remember, it's not just saying we're going to fund religious schools. It's saying the parents that get the voucher, that get the tax credit from the government, for whatever reason the state has decided to set up a school choice program, then you cannot exclude religious schools or it violates the U.S. Constitution and specifically the free exercise of religion, which we have seen over time for many decades, meant very little to the Supreme Court, unfortunately.

They would overlook that part of the Constitution and kind of go to other provisions of the Constitution. But for the last three, four years, we saw this new life being breathed into that to the point where, listen, the liberal justices are taking notice. And Justice Sotomayor's dissent, she wrote in 2017, now in 2017, I want you to understand what she's talking about here. With all the serious issues we deal with as a country and that the Supreme Court deals with, it was a playground case, a playground reimbursement program to make playgrounds safer in the state of Missouri. So one of these, of course, was a church playground. And she wrote in 2017, I fear that the court was leading us to a place where separation of church and state is a constitutional slogan, not a constitutional commitment.

Today the court leads us to a place where separation of church and state becomes a constitutional violation. So you see the anger there. I like to put into context that her anger started because she didn't want the church playground to be at the same level as a public school playground.

Safety-wise. Which you think the kid playing on the playground or who falls on the playground cares about the doctrine at that point of their age of where they fell, or you think their parents will really, you know, of where it's safe. But that's where it starts with them. That's how insane they are on these issues. And their commitment to the idea of separation of church and state over actual constitutional protections like the free exercise of religion. So the court said, we have repeatedly held that a state violates the free exercise clause when it excludes religious observers from otherwise available public benefits. Harry, that does not sound like a difficult concept to grasp, but yet the Supreme Court for, I've been litigating this issue for four decades. I think they got it right now and we're getting in the right framework, but you cannot penalize the religious school simply because they have a sectarian base.

I think you're precisely correct. And I think the progressives on the United States Supreme Court are precisely wrong. They fail to understand that this particular decision issued by the United States Supreme Court arguably advances religious freedom.

Why? Because the money follows the neutral or independent choice of the parents. It is this program, at least as amended by the United States Supreme Court, does not advance religion. But the progressives fail to understand that. So if you look at Justice Breyer's dissent, he argues that this particular decision advances religious strife. He is completely wrong.

He's got it backwards. It advances the concept of neutrality as opposed to religious strife. And I think at the end of the day, the American people will agree with it. Their version of neutrality though, the dissent, and this has been consistent with the left side of the court, their view of neutrality is exclude religious participants. They don't view neutral as we'll treat everybody the same, neutral. They believe neutral is you disqualify the religious advocate this way, the government is neutral as to religion.

But here's what the Chief Justice has been issued by John Roberts, signed by all five of the conservative justices. While a state need not subsidize private education, in other words, you can't compel a state to subsidize private education, once a state decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious. In other words, the Free Exercise Clause does not allow a burden to be placed on the religious participant simply because they are religious. And that's important to point out.

Yeah. And again, this is just, it's up to the parents here. As like Harry was talking about, this is not the state saying we're going to favor religious schools.

The idea is to really think about it like this way. Why is it okay for the non-sectarian private schools to get the money? I mean, this is an idea is that the left doesn't like school choice. And anything that could be a barrier to school choice programs, they support. This was a barrier, this idea that if we open this up, is it going to be some constitutional fight that we have to take all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court? Because in some areas, the only choice that people are going to have is potentially religious schools, or they might want to choose religious schools. And so we just won't have a school choice program. But the Supreme Court is making it clear and clear, you hopefully don't have to have another constitutional crisis, whether it's striking down the Blaine Amendments.

Which they are now. Which they have been doing for a couple of years, which were anti-Catholic amendments put out in the 1800s. That started, and now we started to see really the opening of school choice. So while the left wants to make it couch it in, oh, this is favoring religion, what this is doing is it's hurting teachers' unions and the major teachers' union groups. Because people say, you know, when they have the choice, they're going to choose probably not the public school, let's put it that way, if they have a choice of some other schools, including private schools that might not be religious at all. So the court also said by conditioning the availability of benefits in a manner that the state main constitution does, like the programs and then it says in Trinity, which is a previous case, effectively this penalizes the free exercise of religion. So in other words, Harry, if you exclude the religious institution simply because the sectarian meets all of the other accreditation requirements, the Northeast Association of Colleges and Schools, yes, checks that box, has the significant curriculum that they needed, checks that box. But the fact that they were religiously affiliated meant an automatic disqualification. And my view is, Harry, and I know you've written about this, I have too, is that kind of targeted discrimination is exactly what the free exercise clause was designed to prevent.

You are precisely correct, Jay. Many progressives claim to support the non-discrimination principle. But in reality, they oppose the non-discrimination principle when it comes to either religious schools, religious institutions, or religious individuals. So I think at the end of the day, if you look at this particular decision by the United States Supreme Court, it upholds the principle of non-discrimination, which means that religious institutions, religious parents, they are treated the same as other individuals and groups. And I think at the end of the day, that is what neutrality means. But keep in mind that the progressives on the United States Supreme Court, they are not neutral.

They oppose any form of religion within the public square. They assume that Christianity on one hand is a majority religion, but then they rightly point out that there are 100 different religions in the United States. So in reality, there is no majority religion in the United States. And so neutrality commands that we treat every single person equally within the meaning of a free exercise clause of the Constitution. And, Jordan, would you point out that this is a parent's choice issue, which is totally correct. Here's what the court said. As noted in a neutral benefit program in which public funds flow to religious organizations through the independent choices, the independent choices, that would be the parents, of private benefit recipients does not offend the establishment clause. And the court goes on to say that they had in previous cases held that interest in separating church and state more fiercely than the federal constitution cannot qualify as compelling in the face of an infringement of the free exercise clause. So this idea that, well, they could argue the state constitution gives more church state separation, thus you could exclude religious groups. The Supreme Court finally, and by the way, I've been arguing this for 40 years, finally closes that hole and says, no, no, no, a state constitution cannot be used. We had this in New York with a number of cases I litigated the Supreme Court. A state constitution cannot be used to override the free exercise clause, which again, sounds basic, the supremacy clause, but it took this opinion for the court to get there. This is discrimination against religion.

The main program is very clear by the U.S. Supreme Court. I'll take Kelly's call very quickly in Arizona on line one. Hey, Kelly.

Hi, thank you for taking my call. Um, I have a question. I, for my reading of the constitution, I thought there was no such thing as separation of church and state. I thought the constitution said the government shall not dictate what religion a person could keep. So whenever they keep saying separation of church and state, I do not read that in the constitution. And if you'll answer that after, it's not in the constitution, uh, the separation of church and state. The idea though, judicially is certainly in our laws and there's a, I think there's a good way of looking at it and a bat and an over, over the top way of looking at a bad way of looking at it.

And for too many decades, it's been the bad way. Supreme court has used that to just keep religion and treat it totally separate from everyone else. And now it's moved to say, you know, we're not going to establish the church of the United States, but if you have a program like this, you can't exclude religious people or religious schools. Be right back on Sekulow. Welcome back to Sekulow. Now, great victory out of the US Supreme Court for school choice, uh, for religious liberty.

And again, if you've got a question about it, you can continue to call in 1-800-68-431. Tim is very clear from the Supreme Court in their decision today and the opinions are written, the majority opinion written by Chief Justice Roberts. We've uncovered, this is a letter, June 17th from Democrat members of Congress from both the Senate, Mark Warner and the House as well. Pretty well known Democrats on this letter to the CEO of Google. Let me read this to you because if they can't get the FBI or DOJ to do it, they want the companies to do it themselves, enforce their ideology. They write this to the CEO of Google, we write today regarding disturbing new reports that Google has been directing users who search for abortion services toward anti-abortion quote fake clinics, also known as crisis pregnancy centers or pregnancy resource centers, without any disclaimer indicating these businesses do not provide abortions and seek to steer women away from certain health decisions.

In the wake of the leaked Supreme Court decision that would overturn Roe vs Wade, we find these reports especially concerning and would appreciate your immediate attention to this matter. It goes on, directing women towards quote fake clinics that traffic in, now this is their favorite word, misinformation and don't provide comprehensive health services is dangerous to women's health and undermines the integrity of Google's search results. Now there's a couple things at play here, Google's a private company. Companies and these organizations pay to be listed higher up in a search result.

You can pay Google when you do your ad program to say if someone searches for this, I want to be listed here or if they search for this from this state or from this city, put me here. That's just capitalism at play and freedom but they are going to try to put this pressure on Google. Let me tell you, I don't feel good about where Google is on this.

Well that's the problem. So Google, you got to make sure that they don't do what they are going to be by nature wanting to do which is to stifle these crisis pregnancy centers. Let me make it clear, pro-life crisis pregnancy centers for women are under attack. We have been litigating this for three decades. We've litigated multiple times at the Supreme Court.

CeCe Howe's been involved in these for over two decades. We are fighting this aggressively but this move and again what you said Jordan, using the word misinformation about crisis pregnancy centers, you got to understand on the state level, some states are trying to do the very same thing. Close them down. Misinformation. Not referring for an abortion.

They'll say that. You have to put up on your, they tried this, you have to put up in your clinic where you can go get an abortion. Compelled speech. We won that at the Supreme Court of the United States but now you've got the Senate and the House trying to basically pressure Google and unfortunately like Jordan says, who knows what Google will do, to go after these clinics once again.

So it's multiple avenues of attack here. Right and pro-abortionists always try to denigrate CPCs every chance they get. That's why they try to call them fake clinics and you know I always think when they say that, okay you want to talk about a fake clinic, let's talk about Planned Parenthood. They're not planning any parenthood at Planned Parenthood if you want to talk about fake clinics.

These are clinics that help women, that provide resources for them throughout their pregnancy free of charge. They do good work and they are at the forefront of this battle, saving babies lives and that is why pro-abortionists are after them on every level. You have Jane's Revenge that is targeting them physically but with violence and vandalism and everything but then you also have now Congress going after them trying to not stop anybody from going to a crisis pregnancy center.

And then you have them under attack being, you know, where they're using fire bombings, vandalism, desecration but actually blowing up the insides of these clinics. And where's the Department of Justice in this? Merrick Garlitz over in Keefe today talking about war crimes which sounds high and mighty but we got a few problems here in the United States you should be paying attention to too. But nothing out of the Department of Justice on this.

Zero. We can tell. Not at all and again you've had over 60 attacks, five fire bombings and the group that is responsible for this is putting out statements, Jane's Revenge, like CeCe said and they're saying that the attacks will only increase in their intensity and will be worse. And so if you're predicting what is worse than fire bombing at night, well it's fire bombing during the day when people are actually there. It's potentially harming people or even taking a life at the violent level. So when you, again, it goes from one thing when you're spray painting, it's another step when it's arson, okay, when you're fire bombing an institution and when you're continuing to make those threats that this is just the beginning.

It's not the end. You're just telling those crisis pregnancy centers shut down, we're warning you or else. And this is why I think the letter from the members of Congress is encouraging this kind of behavior because they call it, these pro-life pregnancy centers, centers of misinformation, like they're somehow bad. They're anti-abortion fake clinics. They're fake, they're misinformation and so what they're asking Google to do is of course say if Google will not take action to prevent anti-abortion fake clinics from appearing in search results. So if you can't be a pro-life pregnancy center that exists in a Google search result. So they say if you won't do that, at least do their second favorite misinformation. Will Google add user-friendly disclaimers about those groups?

Will they flag everything? What steps will Google take to limit the appearance of anti-abortion fake clinics or so-called crisis pregnancy centers in Google search results, Google ads and on Google maps when users search for abortion clinic, abortion pill or similar terms or like abortion I guess. So they want those, they want the pro-life side censored out by the private owner of Google.

That's what they're asking for. Absolutely and once again it's because these crisis pregnancy centers are on the front lines and they pose a huge threat to the bottom line. They save babies lives. So people aren't going to Planned Parenthood to get the abortions. They actually give them information. It's not misinformation. When you go to Planned Parenthood you get no information.

They don't want you to have the information about the baby inside of you and so they these you go to crisis pregnancy centers you get the information and they don't want that. But this is all part of a very orchestrated attack on the pro-life movement and it also emanates from the disclosure of the Supreme Court decision, the draft opinion in Dobbs and now what you're seeing happen and I believe this is part of an orchestrated plan the harassment of the justices at their home which Merrick Artland's done nothing about. The desecration and firebombing of crisis pregnancy center clinics which the Justice Department Merrick Artland have done nothing about and now the House and Senate putting pressure upon Google to stop these crisis pregnancy centers from even appearing in Google maps.

I mean think about that for a moment. That this is an orchestrated attempt. Absolutely after the Dobbs opinion was leaked people saw the the the pro-abortionists saw the writing on the wall Roe v Wade was a bad decision. There is no constitutional right to abortion. That again does not mean that relieves it or sends it back to the states but there is no constitutional right to abortion and and the left and the pro-abortionists are freaking out and they're attacking every way that they can. The justices, the CPCs in any manner that they can shut this down they will. If they're not going to get the right decision out of the Supreme Court they're going to take it directly to the states and to the crisis pregnancy centers that are saving these babies. Yeah so they're trying to use big tech to censor pro-life speech to to shut down the ability for pro-life pregnancy centers to advertise which a lot of times you're paying I bet in almost all those situations those pro-life pregnancy centers are spending resources they have fundraised so that they can be in those advertising spots.

Everyone realizes that through Google that the the things that come up there some they actually say are ads right off the top that people have paid for then others again are based off where people are clicking what people again are paying for in these searches but see they they can't silence the speech legally as the government they want these content platforms like Google to silence the speech for them. We can't allow that to happen in the United States of America we have to stand up for speech that includes pro-life speech even in the face of the threat of violence. Support the work of the ACLJ at ACLJ.org be right back. For decades now the ACLJ has been on the front lines protecting your freedoms defending your rights in courts in Congress and in the public arena. The American Center for Law and Justice is on your side if you're already a member thank you and if you're not well this is the perfect time to stand with us at ACLJ.org where you can learn more about our life-changing work become a member today ACLJ.org. Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever this is Sekulow and now your host Jordan Sekulow. Welcome back to Sek Hill we'll take your phone calls to 1-800-684-3110 a couple of issues we've already hit one is a big case out of the Supreme Court yet again the second time in two years and a series really since 2017 of saying you know if you're gonna have these state funds available to schools or that's gonna be a school choice program or a voucher program however the state sets it up you cannot exclude religious schools that is a violation of the US Constitution that was clear in the opinion today the course is the case is Carson versus Macon a six to three decision and it says there's nothing neutral about this is at a mains program the state pays tuition for certain students at private schools so long as the schools are not religious that is discrimination against religion so the idea that all schools are okay except for religious schools has fallen again at the US Supreme Court the second issue we talked about is this attack by members of Congress Democrats on pro-life pregnancy centers sending a letter to Google CEO asking that CEO and Google to start implementing a shutdown basically a silencing of those abilities for those pro-life pregnancy centers to advertise in Google search and Google search engines and also to put disclaimers and they of course while there's violence against these pregnancy centers occurring across the country they use terms that are very nasty about them calling them fake abortion clinics misinformation they use that of course their keyword there but we do have a call coming in about the school choice case Lou in Washington State online to hey Lou hi thanks for what you do and taking my call thank you so happy about the correct SCOTUS decision regarding school choice vouchers to include faith-based education and I'm wondering if parents will be able to get funds back that they recently paid for their religious school that was refused illegally well I knew it's interesting it's a good question so in Maine the court now held that the parents should have been could they apply for reimbursement I think I think there's an argument that can be made that they were wrongfully denied a benefit and depending on the statute of limitations they probably can't now what remember what this does not do this doesn't compel a state to provide for private funding for personal funding for private education it still doesn't require school choice but it says if you have a school choice you can't target the religious program for exclusion and I think what it's doing is making it easier for states every one of these cases and I'm not sure there's gonna have to be another one there might be different challenges but this one's been so clear but it's so that states that want to implement school choice programs have a clear roadmap in what's not going to be a federal violation especially even if they have state laws to their state laws that might say they prevented have now been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court so they can move forward in implementing a full-on school choice program that doesn't exclude any schools it doesn't exclude private schools of whatever their sectarian or non-sectarian whatever their religious beliefs may be this is again this has been going on the Supreme Court really relooking at this since 2017 a very similar case in 2020 out of Montana and now we saw in Maine and in Maine it was really a situation where Maine had no choice they did not have enough public schools in rural areas to service their their constituents so they could not abide by what they have to actually you know provide their their citizens taxpayers by law so they wanted to have the school choice program but they wanted to exclude religious schools so they included private schools they didn't say pick the even the public school of your choice or the the charter school your choice they said everything including private schools unless they're religious and that's what the Supreme Court said no that violates the free exercise of religion that's unconstitutional I think this matter is very settled the left is angry about it but it should be a green light then for your states if you don't have school choice programs to create those which means you've got to work with your legislators to get those in place but now there'll be no prohibition for religious faith-based institutions you know secondary schools elementary schools kindergartens from participating in these programs so that is a great decision and a great outcome and it limited a case that we had Locke versus Davie significantly which was causing a problem this case we argued 20 years ago but they've really limited the scope of that so that's all very good sport to work with the ACLJ as well yeah that's right ACLJ.org and we got a lot more to talk about today on the broadcast we're about to get a live report from ACLJ Jerusalem the Israeli government has fallen in in the Knesset they weren't able to put a coalition together which means there'll be another election in Israel could be a different prime minister we're gonna go to Jeff Balabon from our office in ACLJ Jerusalem who's joining us in the next segment of the broadcast don't miss that be right back exceptional track record of success but here's the bottom line we could not do our work without your support we remain committed to protecting your religious and constitutional freedoms that remains our top priority especially now during these challenging times the American Center for Law and Justice is on your side if you're already a member thank you and if you're not well this is the perfect time to stand with us at ACLJ.org where you can learn more about our life-changing work become a member today ACLJ.org Welcome back to SECUIT I want to update you on some international news we know you care about and again to get in some of the details there in Israel the coalition government has fallen inside the Israeli Knesset so there is what does that mean likely there's going to be another election in Israel the fifth election in three years which would determine the makeup of the Knesset and that then determines the makeup of who is ultimately prime minister and who can put together a coalition we have ACLJ Jerusalem our office in Jerusalem we're joined now by our senior counsel who runs that office Jeff Balabon from Jerusalem and Jeff just right away a reaction this was a coalition that was from the beginning people are even surprised that it lasted a year because it went from for the first time had an Arab party as a member it had some leftist parties as members some very right-wing parties as members and a fairly young prime minister but it is now fallen yes it has fallen and in fact as you described it was a very strange coalition people did not believe it would last that long because it wasn't just that it had Arab parties in it and right-wing parties in it you know Israel has a number of parties that has both Jews and Arabs in the party that are well integrated in this case we're talking about Arab parties that actually have supported Hamas in the Muslim Brotherhood and to have right-wing figures like Naftali Bennett join with parties that are so extreme people really didn't think it would last them people were shocked and what seems to happen now is that it's that governing coalition that pushed for this election because they know that it's collapsing and it seems that they're trying to push to have this done quickly so that Bibi Netanyahu doesn't have a chance to pull together a new governing coalition yeah so because people need to understand this is not Israel's system of government is not like the United it's not a constitutional republic so it's coalition governments which is very similar to the UK system and those could fall apart which Andy that's exactly what happened here but it's not a constitutional republic no it's not a constitutional republic and is it's not for example a two-party republic as is in the United States it is more like the British system but even more so because you've got multiple multiple parties beyond just Tories and labor and Scottish nationalists you've got as Jeff pointed out multiple parties Bennett had put together a coalition of believe it was eight ideologically diverse parties and it seems that their ideal ideological diverseness and diversity was being united by their dislike of Netanyahu yes so that's what kept them together well that's not a basis upon which to keep a government together what's the maid Jeff what and you're over there obviously run our office in Jerusalem what was the major issue I know there were security issues I know there was economic issues that caused this coalition to fall apart really but a year after it came together yeah I think you're exactly right I think it's a combination first of all it's against the backdrop that we have in America also of a general malaise financial malaise the economics aren't as good as they'd hoped Corona is back and that's causing some issues and that never helps the governing party but the two major issues seems to be that it is in fact it has been for many years now a referendum on BB Netanyahu and the right wing which some members of which I guess we're chafing under BB stronghold thought maybe they could branch out on their own but what they've done it seems many believe is actually unite the right ideologically the center-right who did not like this alternative were very uncomfortable because of some of the parties that were involved and so again it's really the governing coalition that's trying to push this as quickly as possible because they sense that at this point BB can now pull together a coalition of Israeli Zionist parties that are uncomfortable with what's been going on here for the past year well is that is that is what people predict I mean I know that you can't you never know the outcome of how elections might come out of a government party but is this what Israelis expect to happen because I know our audience here they're very familiar with for Prime Minister Netanyahu did they expect that this will usher in his return most people I speak to I would say are hopeful they were not happy with what's been happening until now even though as everyone is saying they were surprised that lasted this long what we'll notice I think is more security talk and security isn't always negative there's also the Abraham Accords and BB can take credit for the Abraham Accords and they continue to bring great benefit to this country and we'll even see how this plays into President Biden's trip to Saudi Arabia that will be interesting as well but I think that people know that despite the internal political mechanisms that Andy was talking about and the personalities that tend to drive coalition politics there is a view of Israel as a Jewish state that has been somewhat if not abandoned then damaged by the last year and they would like to see that maybe reformed so there is hope the question is do they have the time does maybe have the time to assemble a coalition among all these fractious parties and that's going to see when this vote actually comes up it will be tomorrow Jeff you said that it's probably four or five coalition members that you could peel off that would form a majority for Likud to take the lead and to form a government what is that time frame where he'd have to do that and second part of that question is has there been any indication that there's movement on that regard so unless something's happened in the last few minutes which it may have it was still up in the air whether this could happen as soon as tomorrow and and that's why the government the current governing coalition is going to call for the election usually opposition tries to topple a government here it's the current governing coalition knowing that sensing that they're probably on the way out and that bb given a little more time can pull together a coalition is calling for it to happen as quickly as possible and maybe as soon as tomorrow but as quickly as possible to deny bb that chance Jeff I wanted to ask you the fact that former prime minister Netanyahu is now under charges being prosecuted for whatever allegations that stem from his tenure in office do you think that that lessens his likelihood of being able to cobble something together before the elections or do you think that that just doesn't have an effect at all I would actually say it's the opposite I would say that what most people are now satisfied is that it's what bb said all along that there's no there there to those charges and actually that's one of the factors that could be helping him now that people feel like this was political and he did not get a fair shake and they don't like what was done to him so even people who might have had a problem a year ago are more comfortable with bb now yeah but you would think to me as again not israeli but they're going to make israelis are going to make their decision but when you have an administration which is opening up they tried to reopen the the palestinian consulate in jerusalem and taking those steps again taking a more anti-israel position at international institutions that you might want to bring in back a stronger leader not not someone who's kind of was seen as a kid with a fragile fragile coalition but someone the world knows the world deals with including major world leaders because i think we saw too jeff there was a misstep very early on by the current prime minister and again not judging there about him but trying to be a broker between russia and ukraine as a country of seven million being really out fronting that and and even that damaging some of israel's credibility early on and i think that probably israelis want to move past that i think that's actually a fantastic point and i think that's exactly right in other words the the argument will be made no doubt by by bennett's side and others who would be in coalition with bennett the more left-wing parties that you don't want to see a return to the kind of fractious existence between the israeli government under bb netanyahu and a democratic run america they don't want you know everyone knows there was a lot of tension more than tension between barack obama as President and bb netanyahu's prime minister in fact President obama actually villainized bb very directly and there's a sense that they'll argue that they want to see that again we need america here in israel well the other sense is what you just said jordan and i think that's more the overwhelming sense on the street that i've been hearing and also among people in the know that israelis really don't want to hear that they want a leader who's a true leader who will put israel's interest first around the world they know they see they feel the warm warm and productive peace that's happening in the arab world with israel and they want to see more of that and that really rests with bb not with anyone else so jeff if there is a actual if bb cannot pull this coalition together in this interim period when would the election be that's a great question uh they there's the system is complicated there are the calls for multiple votes and so uh it may take let's say three to four months till there's an election and then you know there's a period of time where they have to form a government so everything hinders right now well i shouldn't say everything j but so much hinders right now how quickly the current government is able to push forward this vote if they could actually get it to happen immediately they're hoping it'll deny and it's an outside chance but they're hoping they'll deny bb the chance to put together a coalition but the truth is i haven't heard anyone able to think of a scenario where there's any coalition that's not bbs so uh that's it's almost like two conflicting things it's very hard to imagine and pulling it together right away but there is a sense that the right-wing parties and the centrist parties uh are united they don't like what they've had the last year and so um listen bb is best best with his back against the wall and people who are in the bb camp seem optimistic and people who are in the zionist camp uh tend to feel that they will or the center-right camp which is really most of the country center right tend to feel that they will get um they're hopeful that bb will be able to pull it out look benjamin netanyahu has been a strong leader for israel for a long long time he's made multiple comebacks we worked with him uh and the and in our defense of israel at the international criminal court we also saw them the gollant heights declaration that i had the privilege of being with prime minister netanyahu when that was signed by President trump so though some great developments all right jeff we appreciate it from our office we're from jerusalem it's late at night there not at our office today but uh was earlier in the day but again folks the aclj has an office operating in jerusalem support the work aclj.org pulling back to some domestic issues that everyone is facing on a daily basis here we talked about a lot on this broadcast but President biden on the beach having to respond to a reporter's question directly about the oil prices about inflation about their commitment to the green new deal because this administration has on the one hand said you know they wrote the nasty grams to the oil companies you're not refining enough oil while at the same time they said they are committed to ending the fossil fuel industry so why would that industry spend more resources to bail out the biden administration and and also why would that be a good decision for their shareholders an economic good economic decision but here's President biden this is yesterday on the beach take a listen because when we say that this is done intentionally to punish you maybe it's gotten out of their control but it was done intentionally they wanted the prices to go up they wanted this to happen this was intentional policies that have just gone out of control take a listen to President biden i'm working with uh our team is put together at the same time my dear mother used to have an expression everything lousy something good will happen if you look hard enough for it we have a chance here to make a fundamental turn toward renewable energy electric vehicles and not just electric vehicles but across the board so here's what's so disheartening about this in my view is number one i agree with jordan jordan said this earlier on our broadcast weeks ago that this energy crisis was going to be utilized to make this pivot now the problem is most people can't afford the 60 or 70 thousand dollars for an electric car one two there's not an electric power stations enough of them to keep people actually on the road that's number two number three they're screaming at the gas companies uh to produce more while they're telling you at the same time we're putting you out of business in two to five years so these inconsistent messages the reason gas around the corner from here is five dollars and 99 cents a gallon so the the mixed messaging here harry is incredible but they at least disclosed that they're going to use this crisis to make a pivotal turn i think that is precisely correct so what the biden administration is trying to do is to drive fossil fuel prices up higher and higher they keep talking about for instance electric um uh cars they talk about wind power they talk about solar power all of those things are unreliable even electric uh powered cars are driven by what largely fossil fuels so 70 percent of the electricity in the united states is generated by fossil fuels and so i think at the end of the day the biden administration is doing nothing to boost international supplies of oil wheat fertilizer and other crucial commodities depleted by all sorts of events in the world he's doing nothing uh to increase the supply of goods and services from china which has engaged in an economically damaging covet 19 containment policy so at the end of the day biden sees this as a moment of transformation and the transformation will cost the american people more and more dollars and it will threaten um ultimately the employment of many americans going forward you know one of the things i said to watch out for and what's going on in ukraine uh and russia in that conflict is and that you know they're and of course joe biden blames the gas prices as putin's increase but there's a little news that came out over the weekend it's not getting a lot of attention but i think it's potentially very very very dangerous and that is russia has made threats against lithuania a nato member because of actions lithuania has taken colonel west smith is with us because this all ties into the energy issue what exactly has happened uh on this and what what did lithuania allegedly do that's caused this reaction yeah what lithuania has done is they have blocked all rail shipments that go through lithuania going to kaliningrad kaliningrad is a territory claimed by russia that has no border with russia it's on the baltic sea and so it's important to russia they actually have nuclear controls that kaliningrad is that controlled by russia that's russia yes and as a matter of fact their baltic fleet one of their big naval fleets their headquarters is in kaliningrad they have nuclear capable missiles in kaliningrad so they have depended for all these years on rail service getting supplies in and out what lithuania has done is they have uh gone along with eu sanctions they didn't do this on their own the eu sanctioned certain materials from being brought out of russia exported from there it includes coal metals construction material advanced technology and so that's what lithuania has done rail service with passengers and food still goes every day from russia to kaliningrad so it's not a total blockade and uh lithuania has have the legal right to do that yes i checked and so they actually do they're part of the european union and under that charter whenever they pass legislation uh every country's supposed to abide by it they have no formal agreement on the rail service from russia to kaliningrad and so they're simply going along with the eu sanctions okay let me just ask the third natural question so they had the legal right to do it lithuania they're a nato member how dangerous of a move was it it's pretty brave because as you and i both know brave but dangerous yes it could be i mean in the past as you and i've talked in the 20th century acts like this created wars right uh you take this combined with russia not letting any grain exports out of ukraine those two issues are strategically less important than what happened that started world war one so this is the problem join with all of us is you've got the situation with you got joe biden saying oh you know yeah we've got this oil prices gas prices are going through the roof people better get used to electric cars harry rightly says we're not really ready for that uh you've got the battle with putin and and zelinsky in russian ukraine and then lithuania does something they have a right to do to say no we're not we're gonna we're gonna abide by the un the eu sanctions but the cost of that in previous decades could have literally started world war three yeah i mean i think again this is something not getting enough attention because this is where again it's costing the u.s a lot of money the biden administration's blaming everything on this but what everyone would be most concerned about is that what would trigger a potential more u.s action or western european action uh including whether it's our troops our pilots our aircraft all that and the the fact that there does not seem to be a resolution in sight at all about what's going on in ukraine and the the idea that the ukrainians were pushing back strongly against russia that is true and that is continues to be true but russia has succeeded in many ways it just doesn't they don't succeed in the ways we usually define in the west because of the loss of of life they've had loss of troops but this is how they fight and so they they will take a tremendous amount of losses but they are still winning technically on the battlefield jordan's right you mentioned the situation with the lack of the ability to get grain out of ukraine and other materials this could have a devastating economic impact for the rest of the world absolutely so we are already experiencing grain and food shortages throughout the world and it's important to re-emphasize uh jordan's point russia is actually winning this war even though it's coming at a very very high price so as we drive up fossil fuel prices guess what we are fueling russian success in ukraine and the sanctions that we have imposed on russia they're backfiring the cost of sanctions are being paid for by the american people all right 30 seconds is russia winning the war they are wearing ukraine down and yes slowly they are winning the war uh the jury's still out anything could happen but they are wearing ukraine down folks you know the analysis we give you on this broadcast as well as the ability for us to engage in these issues is because of your support of the aclj now today you've heard from our experts around this in the studio here you've heard from our head of our office in jerusalem this happens because of your support of the aclj let me encourage you to do that at aclj.org also we've set up a new 501c4 called aclj action go to acljaction.org $25 one time and you're a member