Iran Elects Mass-Murderer as Next President, As US Begins Lifting Sanctions

Today on Sekulow, Iran elects a mass murderer as their next President, while the Biden team continues their negotiations to re-enter a nuclear deal with this new Iranian regime. We'll talk about that today on Sekulow. He could have chosen, he chose the hangman of Tehran, the man infamous among Iranians and across the world for leading the death committees which executed thousands of innocent Iranian citizens throughout the years. Phone lines are open for your questions right now.

Call 1-800-684-3110. Ibrahim Raisi is a cleric and senior judge close to Iran's supreme leader. He's under sanction currently by the US for alleged human rights abuses, including his role in the lethal crackdown on protesters in 2009.

And now, your host, Jordan Sekulow. So you heard that right in the opening and you heard from Israel's new prime minister, Naftali Bennett, this view of this new Iranian President and the way it works there, he was elected over the weekend, now he would be inaugurated and would take office in August. This is while the nuclear talks are ongoing. These candidates in Iran are handpicked and approved by the Ayatollah, so you don't get to just choose to run for office there, and they made it where this is one of the lowest turnouts ever in Iranian politics because there was so lack of any choice in this election. This individual is also someone who many inside Iran see as a possible successor to the current Ayatollah, so this would put him on the next path as well, potentially to fill that role as there's an aging Ayatollah who is 82 years old. But you heard of that opening. Literally, Iran has elected by placing this individual on the ballot, the other choices were like the head of one of the divisions of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and someone else, and none of them were really running.

I mean, it wasn't competitive. But this is someone who, again, you heard the word death commissions in the openings. Or I could call it something like a death squad, and what he did after the Iranian Revolution and then things settled down after the Iran-Iraq War, he went in. It was controversial even amongst the Iranian revolutionaries at the time. There were clerics who strongly disagreed with him and this role he was put in, but he went in and basically began running these extrajudicial killing campaigns against nonviolent offenders who were seen as opposed to the Iranian Revolution. So literally, we're talking about thousands upon thousands of people didn't get a trial, some were thrown off cliffs, pregnant women being tortured, but thousands who were killed. And these were nonviolent offenders. These weren't people who took up arms against the Iranian Revolution. They just weren't necessarily supportive of it. So it was controversial at the time. He has been sanctioned for the last two years. So now you have.

Think about this. The new President of Iran that the U.S. administration is currently in talks with in Vienna to set up a nuclear deal and reenter that nuclear deal. The new President is someone who is sanctioned by the U.S. on his own. Someone who murdered thousands of his own people.

And when you can do that to your own people, realize the radicalism that would be coming and is coming at an international level. And this is the type of President the regime in Iran decided, you know what, the Biden team, they want so bad back in this deal, we can put one of the guys we really trust it. The guy who ran the death squads force back in the 80s.

Let's put him in charge and see if the Americans continue to beg to reenter this nuclear deal, which, by the way, he's spoken about that as well. We'll talk about that. Our team's with us. Rick Cornell will be joining us as well. If you want to talk to us on air, 1-800-684-3110. You'd have to be a lunatic yourself to get into negotiations with a lunatic like this. 1-800-684-3110.

That's 1-800-684-3110. We'll be right back. The challenges facing Americans are substantial at a time when our values, our freedoms, our constitutional rights are under attack. It's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. 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. And we have an 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. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, a play on parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life.

Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. What you ought to understand for a minute here, and we'll play Jake Sullivan too because he was asked about it, this was the architect of the JCPOA under the Obama administration. He's back under the Biden administration still pushing for this Iranian nuclear deal. Even with Iran's choice and the regime's choice of putting forward who will become the next President in August, the election has been held. A person who has led what translates from Farsi as a death commission.

I think to better understand it, just think death squad. So after the Iran-Iraq war, which distracted the revolution in Iran right after the revolution, when things started to stabilize inside Iran, he came in and was appointed to basically, and this was controversial even amongst the radicals in the Islamic revolution. There were many who opposed this idea. But that he went around carrying out extrajudicial, so no trial, killings of regime opponents who may have been imprisoned, some who weren't, thousands upon thousands of Iranians who were non-violent opponents of the Iranian revolution. So these were people, again, who were in there maybe for peacefully protesting or just not supporting the overthrow of the Shah in Iran, and this was someone who was tasked with and carried out the murder of those thousands of people. Now, I want you to understand when you talk about someone who will do that to their own people, imagine their worldview against their true enemies, international enemies like the United States or Israel or the Gulf states, and I'm sure they are laughing in their own sick way that the U.S. officials are still begging.

And this is where I get nervous about the Biden team, and Wes, you've got to do a piece of dangers and challenges of reviving the Iranian nuclear deal exposed, but what I'm concerned about right now, Wes, is that they will try to get this deal done before he technically takes the oath of office in August. Because we did the FOIA where they tried to cover up that people like Jake Sullivan were negotiating with Ahmadinejad. It's like history repeating itself once again. They didn't like the optics of that, so they tried to cover that up. This one, they can't change, but they could try to say, well, we did it before he was in charge.

Yeah, exactly. Optics apparently are more important to this team than reality, the stark reality of who Iran is and what's going on on the ground. And as you mentioned, Jake Sullivan is one of the architects of the original JCPOA, which is not just a flawed agreement, it is a dangerous agreement. And he said over the weekend, he actually said this, again, don't confuse them with reality and facts. He said the Trump policy of extreme sanctions on Iran will only increase the chances of Iran getting a nuclear weapon. How in the world does he come up with that kind of logic? He also believes, and he said this too, that if we will go ahead and agree to the JCPOA, pretty much what they're doing in Vienna, Jordan, it's the same thing as what happened in 2015.

They're not making any changes. The real difference will be whether or not we will cave and lift sanctions on Iran. But he actually said that if we agree to it as it is and we lift the sanctions, we can go back to it at a later date and strengthen it. Again, this is a dangerous naivete. It's going on in the name of the United States. It is very frightening. The new President of Iran, that change of leadership, while there's also a change of government in Israel, is also very troubling because look for Iran to test the new prime minister in Israel, too. There's a lot of violence potentially flaring on the horizon. And the Biden team in Vienna and in Washington, D.C., is either incredibly naive or I don't know what because they're turning a blind eye to what's really going on, who Iran really is and what the repercussions will be for the region and for the world. Here it is. This is Jake Sullivan, the lead negotiator on the Iran nuclear deal on a Fox News Sunday yesterday.

Take a listen. What we're intending to do is to reimpose the constraints that put Iran's nuclear program in a box. The limits on enrichment, the limits on stockpile, the intensive verification measures, all of which were included in the original Iran nuclear deal. Once we go back into that deal, Chris, the idea is to negotiate a follow-on agreement that will make for a longer and stronger agreement. That is the next step that U.S. policy will take alongside our partners in the P5 plus one. So, Andy, we know they're violating this the whole time. Whenever abiding by it, the Europeans have told us they weren't abiding by it. They've been honest about it now, say they've increased their centrifuge levels and what they can produce, but now I guess we're trying to, with this new regime, with a death squad leader being elected President who is now on path to even potentially becoming the next Ayatollah, the next supreme leader in Iran, that not only do they need to negotiate one deal, but one deal and then they've got to negotiate a long-term deal as well.

Yeah, we're going to have an agreement, first of all, with a killer, with a person who has been the head of the judiciary in Iran, who has held positions put in place by him by the current Ayatollah, who is his man on the spot to make sure that people are killed who do not agree with the regime, literally slaughtering your own people, this so-called judge, and being a historian, I think only of Roland Freisler, who was Hitler's judge, who did the bidding of the Fuhrer, who was the terrible, horrible, scarlet-robed judge in Nazi Germany, who put people to death with these farcical trials. Now he is going to become the President, and the United States naively is going to sit at the table with their knees together in Vienna and kind of come up with a deal, and then we're going to come up with a deal after that that's going to really make the first deal better than the first deal that we come up with, which is ridiculous. I don't know that it's naivete rather than gross negligence on the part of the Biden administration to do this.

You say, well, they're naive, and they're not naive. They're grossly negligent with the future of the world, not just of the United States, but the future of the world. So Raisi, this again, this would be Ibrahim Raisi will become the next President of Iran in August. This is a clear signal to the United States. Take your thoughts on two.

Rick Grenell's going to be joining us in the next segment, but start getting your calls in because of that second half hour. The idea that the United States would continue negotiations after the supreme leader of Iran decided this is going to be our guy that we hold out as President, the guy who ran our death squads, the guy who's sanctioned by the U.S. government. And by the way, his sanction wasn't lifted by the it was interesting enough by the Biden team is some other sanctions have been lifted inside Iran, not that sanction on him individually. And he's carried out these atrocities against his own people. He's been known as a leader of death commissions or death squads. He's a mass murderer who Amnesty International, I don't agree with everything they put forward, believes he should be prosecuted for crimes against humanity for what he did to the Iranian people in the 1980s.

You know, we've talked about their judicial system before, their court system before. It is dangerous. It is a dangerous place to be in, whether you are a foreign national or an Iranian national. But I want you to understand that Zarif, remember, Mr. Foreign Minister of Iran, he's a friendly face. He's the one we're supposed to trust. He's the one negotiating the nuclear deal. He is just a face, by the way. He's a powerless figure who plays the West and uses Twitter and places like that. This is what he had to say about Raisi.

Take a listen. Mr. Raisi is the President of all Iranians. We have a President who is elected, who is a reasonable man. I have worked with him for 30 years. I know him pretty well. He's a decent man. He's a reasonable man.

Decent and reasonable. I think people like Zarif realize they're on the way out. Yeah, I think so, too. And here's what's going on as the U.S. is meeting in Vienna and as they are likely going to lift sanctions on Iran. And by the way, this new President is individually sanctioned. And so look for the United States to lift sanctions on him, too. But as they're considering re-entering this agreement and lifting sanctions on Iran and its leaders and their energy sector, here's what also is going on in the background. As we know, Iran is now enriching uranium at 60 percent levels. And what we discovered with satellite imagery just in the last two weeks is that in Iran, they have discovered that on a particular nuclear site that Iran is now working on shockwave generators.

This is the necessary device to miniaturize nuclear weapons so that you can place them on the head of ballistic missiles. We actually know now they're also doing that in addition to enriching uranium. And their new President says ballistic missiles will not be on the negotiating table.

All of this is going on. And the head of the IAEA in Vienna, who's not a conservative kind of guy, he said this over the weekend, we have a country, speaking of Iran, that has a very developed and ambitious nuclear program which is enriching at very high levels, enriching uranium at very high levels, very close to weapons grave. This is what is going on while we consider lifting sanctions and re-signing the agreement. Kid on YouTube wrote, how concerned should Israel be with this election along with the rest of the region? Immediately, the new prime minister in Israel, Naftali Bennett, came out condemning this, but also drawing the world's attention to who this individual is. And those kind of words coming from the leader of the Jewish state, when you talk about death squads and death commissions, you are bringing back the idea of the Nazi regime, the Nazis, and the same kind of idea. They're turning on their own citizens.

And if you can kill thousands of your own citizens that way, how dangerous are you at the world stage when you can turn on your own people that way? And you were tasked. They said, let's him be the guy who kills the people. He'll do the dirty work for us. We come back.

Rick Rinnell joins us on Sekulow. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, Planned Parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life.

Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. The challenges facing Americans are substantial. At a time when our values, our freedoms, our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. 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.

And we have an 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. So as we often try to do on this broadcast is to take you to news, and it kind of happens over the weekend, and then the inauguration in Iran is not until August. But we've got to talk to you directly about who this new Iranian leader is. Who is Ibrahim Raisi?

That the Biden team is not putting everything on hold right now, and they didn't go out on the Sunday shows and say, you know what? Maybe we've got to first deal with him, because since we've sanctioned him and we kept those sanctions on him, and they were put on by the Trump administration, but the Biden administration has not yet lifted those sanctions. This is someone who led death squads. Rick Rinnell, senior advisor to the ACLJ, joins us now, and I'm glad he was able to do it today, because, Rick, this to me is a signal from the true Iranian leaders, the supreme leader and his advisors to the U.S. and the world that we believe we can put our most extreme supporters and thugs in place as our President. And still, you'll want to deal with us. Still, you'll beg us to join this nuclear deal.

Yeah, let's think about that. This is a killer. This guy is an unbelievable mass murderer.

He has sanctions on him, and yet the Biden administration is going to be negotiating with him. To me, Andy, what I hear about this, someone who's got a record of turning on his own people this way, you mentioned a Nazi judge who was known as Hitler's judge. Yeah, Roland Freisler, you may have heard of him, ambassador. He was Hitler's judge. He was the head of the judiciary, and when you went before him, you were verbally abused, you were physically abused, you were convicted, you were dead on arrival, and he worked his way up through the judiciary. That is the message that the Iranian supreme leader who supported this guy, who's hand-picked him, of course, obviously, he wouldn't have been President if the Ayatollah hadn't chosen him. What is he telling Biden? What is he saying to Biden? Well, unfortunately, I think he's saying to Biden exactly what everybody else is saying. The Chinese leader, the Russian leader, they're all saying to Biden that we need to test you.

We are going to try and figure out how much we can get away with, how far we can push it. At this point, the Iranian regime seems to be in control of the negotiations. The Europeans want the Americans at the table.

The Americans are rushing to the table. They're rewarding the Europeans and the Iranians with the process. But we're not even talking yet about the substance, and I fear that the substance, there's nothing that we can agree on to move forward if you're trying to deny Iran a nuclear weapon. You know, one thing, Rick, that I thought was unique is that we know from this team, we know from Jake Sullivan specifically in his role, that back under the Biden, under the Obama administration, there was that cover-up move by the State Department, and we filed the FOIA to get that uncovered about, where they clipped out part of a press conference about when they actually began negotiations with Iran, because they didn't want people to know at the time that they actually started those negotiations with Ahmadinejad, with the more radical President of Iran.

They didn't wait until Rouhani was there. Now, unless they try to play some game, which we've talked about, maybe they can get into the deal before he's technically the President. But ultimately, whether they do that or not, between now and August, this is their guy who is a direct pick by the Ayatollah, yes, but not someone who's there to soften Iran's image at all. No, there's no reform idea here.

I mean, let's think about it. We are negotiating with somebody who is under sanctions restrictions from the United States. This is a real problem, and I think that what you're going to find is the Biden administration is going to be in a corner very soon. They're going to realize that the Iranians are not coming forward with any new ideas.

They're not coming forward to somehow show that they've been honest. And the only deal that's going to be offered is a deal where they continue to work towards programs that develop a nuclear weapon. And we've got to pray, we've got to hope, and we've got to keep the pressure on the Biden administration that they reject the offer that's coming towards them. You know, Rick, one of the things that I find astonishing and troubling is how many of our supposed allies are pushing us to lift the sanctions and reenter the agreement. But one of them over the last few days that's been in the news a lot is that Germany in particular, and you're the former ambassador to Germany, that Germany in particular is really, they have the full court press on trying to get the United States lift the sanctions and reenter the agreement.

What is your in? Why is Germany pushing so hard on this? Well, first of all, they don't have the same threat assessment that we do when it comes to Iran or China or any other country. They have a Germany first economic model. They have a large economy with a huge surplus, and they maximize making sure that they get trade. They want to trade with Iran, they want to open up their economy. It's not too much to say that they would rather have trade than take a firm stance on human rights. That's the reality of today's Germany.

Final question, Rick, just for you on this. With this move by Iran, it's not like anyone is winning since the revolution there in 1979 that isn't kind of handpicked. But certainly they knew what the pick like this would do to our allies in the Gulf, to Israel, and the United States.

It also gives a lot of ammo to those opposed to the nuclear deal. Biden's team wants to go full forward with this, but this is a new criticism point of what are you thinking of dealing with this regime. But it goes to, Jordan, it goes to the fact that we've talked about this before, is that the Biden administration is determined to have consensus with the Europeans, which means the Europeans get to decide what our policy is together. We, the United States, are somehow believing that we are going to be safer if we're with the Europeans and we have a watered down policy. And I just think that it's dangerous to think about having the Europeans and the Americans have the identical policy because I go back to the threat assessment. The threat assessment for Europe and the United States is not the same. We are under different threats. And so if you're going to join the Western Alliance, if you're going to be with us, you've got to understand that the Western Alliance, the Transatlantic Alliance has the Americans as a pillar and the Americans are under a bigger threat.

Rick, as always, thank you for joining us. And it's on short notice too, as senior advisor to the ACLJ, just to get that insight, because again, we knew this is where Iran was going, but it was solidified this weekend. And now we know this is who the U.S. will be dealing with. I mean, this is the, again, it's the, the Supreme Leader runs Iran. We all understand that. No one is debating that.

But it is important to see who they decide to put forward as the elected leaders. So even though that's a farce, you look and you see the difference between Ahmadinejad, who was very rough around the edges, was part of the hostage takers, was one of the hostage takers of the U.S. embassy in Iran during the revolution in 1979. He was not schooled like an Ayatollah or a religious leader.

He was more of a ground trooper. He actually criticized this election. This is someone coming right out of the regime, coming right out of the theology schools of the regime as well, holds their hardline views and has carried out some of their worst human rights abuses on the Iranian people.

He is a death squad leader who is now, look, he was now on path. He's been elected, will be inaugurated in August, and we're going to go into a nuclear deal with this guy and this group. We'll be right back. 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.

Freedom! And now, and that was kind of last minute because we wanted to get his insight into how Iran has decided to put forward as their next President. Their next President, Ibrahim Raisi, is someone who has been involved heavily in Iran's horrendous judiciary. I mean, just a judiciary that once you are stuck inside, the rope around your neck is getting tighter and tighter every single day you're in Iranian custody, especially if you're a kind of political prisoner. Well, this is someone who made sure in the 1980s to wipe out most political opponents. Political, not violent. In fact, they were specifically nonviolent opponents of the Iranian revolution that he led a death commission.

That's how it translates. A death commission to kill and execute these people. And along the way, while throwing some off the cliffs, he also was well known for having pregnant women tortured. Having people turn on their own friends and family by torture and then say, oh yes, they did do this. They were the opponents of the regime. So this is just an extremely bold move by Iran to say, you want the nuclear deal back, we're going to really make you have to do a deal with the devil. And I think we're doing that the first time around because we know from our work that they were dealing with Ahmadinejad, who was pretty close to dealing with the devil himself. But this guy is on track to also, not just becoming the President of Iran, but could be on the fast track to becoming the next supreme leader of Iran. So a guy who led death squads for the Islamic Republic, he's very tight with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. So this is someone, again, he's tight with the judiciary inside Iran, the IRGC, and the supreme leader himself. And you see even the foreign minister Zarif, who they put out as kind of the friendly face of Iran, even what he said about him was not a full throated endorsement, I will say that.

It seems like he's nervous as well because at any point he could be seen as one of those opponents of the current revolution. You know, they're always in a revolutionary state and these extrajudicial processes with inside of Iran. But who on earth can you imagine that right now the Biden team, and they decided on Sunday to put their people out on the Sunday shows, are moving forward trying to reenter the JCPOA, also known as the Iranian Nuclear Deal. And their excuse was, this is Jake Sullivan's excuse, his excuse is, well this guy doesn't really run Iran anyways, it's the Ayatollah, it's the supreme leader.

But this is the guy he picked. This is the guy who the supreme leader decided with his history of human rights abuses, not against foreign nationals. Not against Israelis, not against opponents of Iran externally, but of actually getting rid of and killing death squads of their own Iranian citizens who are non-violent opponents of the Islamic revolution. This is who the Biden team thinks it's really great to sit down and have tea with in Vienna and to have these meetings.

I mean, think about that. These are people with blood on their hands, blood on their hands of their own people, and we're trying to empower them on the world stage. We want to lift sanctions on them, we want to get more money flowing to that regime, and the excuse is, well don't worry about him because it's really the Ayatollah. See, they're all over the place. Last time around it was, we're not dealing with Ahmadinejad, it's Rouhani, that's a symbol by the Ayatollah himself that they are moving in a more mainstream position, they want to engage the world more.

Well this pick couldn't be more of the opposite. This is to say, let's just see how far we can push him, and we'll laugh all the way there. The Biden team is trying to put us into this deal with the devil.

We'll be right back. The challenges facing Americans are substantial. At a time when our values, our freedoms, our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. 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.

And we have an 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.

Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, a play on parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift.

Welcome back to Secular. We are taking your phone calls to 1-800-684-3110. That's 1-800-684-3110. So I talked about this, that Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisor, so he has moved up significantly. I mean, from his role initially with the Obama team now to the Biden team. So he's the National Security Advisor, so he's running the National Security Council. But he was a chief architect of the first JCPOA, the first Iranian nuclear deal.

And oh, he wants bad back into another deal. Take a listen, because first you had Lindsey Graham on who said it was like a religious Nazi regime. And that's who we're dealing with in Iran. And Jake Sullivan even tries to use that, how Lindsey Graham described the regime, Senator Graham, as why they can continue on trying to get a deal even though Iran has decided to put forward someone who ran death squads and death commissions against their own people.

Take a listen by 29. What does Joe Biden think of Raisi? Well, of course, we vigorously object to the worldview and the outlook that Raisi has put forward. We don't share his values. We don't share his interests.

But Chris, we also have to keep our eye on the ball. The person who will call the shots on Iran's nuclear program is not Raisi. It's the supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, which you heard earlier from Lindsey Graham. He's the guy ultimately who will make the decision about whether Iran accepts the constraints on its nuclear program that will ensure that it does not get a nuclear weapon.

That's what we are testing right now. That's what our diplomacy is all about. And we are determined to prevent Iran from ever acquiring a nuclear weapon. I want to break that down for people because, again, when you look at the fact that he tries to say, well, it's not really this guy that we've had to deal with, this goes against their entire narrative last time around, which was, see, that guy, that supreme leader, Andy, who really calls all the shots, decided to put in place a more moderate mainstream candidate. And they used that as an excuse. Now they're using it as an excuse, well, this guy doesn't really matter, even though he was the leader of the death squads and picked by the supreme leader, because really we're just dealing with the Ayatollah.

That's great to know. Yeah, well, it does really matter. It doesn't really matter. The Ayatollah is sending him a message. The guy that's going to take over from me is a killer. He kills his own people. He corrupts the judiciary.

He is basically, as Lindsey Graham called him, from the Nazi mold and point of view. And we're going to put him in. And that's the message that I'm sending to you, Joe Biden. I'm telling you that right now.

Listen to me very clearly. He's the guy I support. He's the guy that got 62 percent of the vote of those who voted. A lot of people in Iran didn't vote because they knew it was a joke to vote anyway. But he's the guy that the Ayatollah has now put in. He is the guy who is the face of Iran publicly, although we all know that the Ayatollah really controls what goes on there. But that's the message that he sends to the Biden administration and those who are negotiating and drinking tea on the Kertnerstraße in Vienna with him and having a great time with them trying to suck up to the Iranians and to give them what they want, which is a nuclear bomb. And West brought up something when this guy, Jake Sullivan, says, and we are determined to prevent Iran from ever acquiring a nuclear weapon. My answer to you, Mr. Sullivan, is how?

How are you going to do that? They can never explain how the deal does that, West. They never can put down on paper the first deal.

I mean, if I was Jake Sullivan, I'd still be embarrassed. The deal I'm talking about is some grand deal with a two-page, there's no, like, country logo, there's no formality about what this P5 – it's literally just a bullet point and it's a joint plan of cooperation. It's not a treaty.

It's not a real deal. And this is what they're hoping to get back into in the short term. And then as he says, in the long term, they'll get a better deal.

Yeah. I mean, that's insane talk. When he says we are committed to prevent Iran from ever acquiring a nuclear weapon, that is hollow talk.

And like Andy, my pointed question to this young man, who actually wrote the original JCPOA with another team, is how? What are you doing to stop it? Because right now, Jake, Iran is enriching uranium at 60%. Right now, they're working on shockwave generators so they can miniaturize a nuclear weapon.

They are also working on a ballistic missile program, which basically they've perfected, so they can put those miniaturized weapons on warheads. We've also given them billions of dollars of cash, and last week, you went ahead and lifted more sanctions that Trump administration had put on Iran, so now they have even more money. How do all of those things add up to you preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon?

And by the way, that original JCPOA that he touts as being strong, you know, there was no verification. We could not inspect any military sites, any, in Iran under the JCPOA. That's the logical place they would hide nuclear weapons research and development. So this is hollow talk, and this sounds very caustic, but in my opinion, Jake Sullivan and this team, they are not preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. They are actually facilitating Iran and eventually, and really not that far off, in acquiring a nuclear weapon.

Yeah, we talked about it before, and really that first plan, put them on a path. Okay, this is what you basically need to do to ultimately get your nuclear weapon. So you follow these rules along the way, but along the way you're continuing to increase your nuclear research, you're getting the okay from the world to do that, and then ultimately leading to this.

I want you to listen to, I'm going to read this out. Following the US strike on Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, this is what the new incoming President of Iran had to say in a written statement, Ibrahim Raisi. Quote, I'm addressing the enemy. Let no one think that if someone holds the position of the US President, yet he commits or orders a murder, he will be immune to the enforcement of law and justice and will remain on the sidelines. Never. Those who played a role in this assassination, in this crime, none of them will be safe anywhere on the globe.

This is final. The steel willpower of the resistance movement will exact hard revenge for them. That is a direct threat. It's like issuing, which we know there are fatwas and issues like that, Andy. But that's a direct threat to people like our senior advisor, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, our former President, President Trump. I mean, the list goes on.

I mean, it does. It is a direct threat to them. That's why they still have security protection. The Secretary of State will, Secretary Pompeo will have for many years because they have said to them, never will we relent from our desire and our intention to get those of you who took Soleimani's life and who executed him. We are after you. This is the steel willpower of the resistance movement will exact as you said, as he said, and you quoted, hard revenge from them. Well, what's the hardest revenge? Death.

And that's what these people do. They kill. They kill. They don't simply wound. They don't simply sideline somebody.

They don't neutralize. We've got to understand that we are dealing with people who are relentless killers, and that's who has been elected now President of Iran. And I want you to understand, too, listen to Israel's new prime minister, Naftali Bennett.

He calls it a chance for the world to wake up, and that's what we've been saying, too. At what point do they stop trying to justify continuing these negotiations? This is not stopping them.

As of today, they know about this guy. They know they have sanctions on him, and the Biden administration is still going to go in there, spending your taxpayer dollars and government resources to try and get a deal with a guy who led death squads in Iran for the Ayatollah. Take a listen to the Israeli prime minister.

Raisi's selection is, I would say, the last chance for the world powers to wake up before returning to the nuclear agreement and to understand who they're doing business with. These guys are murderers, mass murderers. A regime of brutal hangmen must never be allowed to have weapons of mass destruction that will enable it to not kill thousands but millions. Israel's position will not change on this. Anyway, there you go, and I think it's a strong statement, Wes, there, from the new prime minister of Israel, but I think what's important there is not even the language used to describe it, which is all true, this brutal hangman at mass murder, but is that it's a last chance for the world powers. Like Rick was talking about, not just the US, but the other P5 plus one powers to wake up to who you're dealing with, stop just thinking about financial interests, stop thinking about legacy items for your bio, Jake Sullivan, and realize that you're dealing with these bad individuals.

Yeah, and it's not even only about human rights, it's about the peace and security of the region, of the entire world, and the United States. If we do not wake up and pull back on this, the result will be Iran will have a nuclear weapon. When that happens, Jordan, it will create a new arms race in the Middle East as well, because they will want weapons too.

Meanwhile, the world's most dangerous country will possess the world's most dangerous weapon. Alright, we come back, we'll take more of your comments, your thoughts. If you want to get a phone call in, do you think this should be the point where the Biden team says no? You know, Iran, you want all these concessions from us, you want back in, you want economic relief from sanctions, you can't have leaders like this, you can't put forward people like this. We're going to walk away. We're not going to beg you anymore to come to the negotiating table. We are going to walk away from the negotiating table. Give us a call.

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Become a member today, ACLJ.org. So we've heard from the Biden administration, we've heard from the Israeli government. Now I want you to hear from the incoming President of Iran, Ibrahim Raisi, in this interview he did with CNN. He's obviously, when you hear him after the questions asked, you're hearing the translation. But again, your first time to kind of hear the tone, the way he is responding to dealing with the United States.

Take a listen. You've already told us how you feel about a direct meeting with President Biden. But would you be willing to talk to and negotiate with the Biden administration? Would your administration be willing to do that?

What do you expect of the Biden administration? And how do you feel about the U.S. proposal for a possible expanded nuclear agreement that would also cover Iran's ballistic missiles and also regional issues as well? Americans broke their promise and the Europeans also did not make good on their commitment. So we are stressing that the U.S. administration, when it comes to its commitment within this deal, the U.S. needs to adhere to that and act accordingly.

Regional issues or ballistic issues are not negotiable. So he's saying right there, this idea of you're going to have two different, basically you'll have the first deal and all the criticisms we had, Wes, of that first deal that the Biden team wants to figure out in a second deal. He's saying no. He's saying no, but that was before he was elected President.

Now he's elected President, put in place by the regime, which means that's the same position as the supreme leader that Jake Sullivan talks about dealing with. Those issues are off the table. You're not going to restrict our ballistic missile program. You're not going to get involved in our regional issues like our call for the death to Israel and also our involvement in the Gulf states.

Yeah, he's making it very clear. On regional issues, they're not going to stop calling for the destruction of Israel. They're also not going to stop their export of terrorism, their support for groups like Hamas and the Houthi rebels and Hezbollah. And they are not going to stop perfecting their ballistic missiles.

Why? Because that's what they need to deliver a nuclear weapon. So basically they're saying all the things that are important in this agreement, they're off the table.

They're non-negotiable. Meanwhile, they are well on their way, if you believe the director of the IAEA, to actually possessing a nuclear weapon. That the breakout time, once they reach that 90% level of uranium, they're at 60% now, that the breakout time for them to develop at least one nuclear weapon has gone from two years to several months. But he is not negotiating on any of those things. Yeah, so you're talking about Syria destabilization, Yemen destabilization. He's not running away from these issues.

They're putting it out very front and center and they're blaming the U.S., of course, for actually maybe it should actually be weaker because you broke the deal the first time. But, Andy, ultimately, to me, these leaders are chosen to send a signal. Rouhani was chosen because they thought, hey, we've got a chance at some serious economic relief.

Let's put someone in place who doesn't rub people the wrong way. Maybe doesn't have a history like some of our – like Ahmadinejad had with the revolution. Or now Raisi has with a post-revolution mass murder. And they've decided, let's put the mass murder forward and see if they still give us the relief.

Well, you're absolutely right, Jordan. When these – when Middle Easterners and people throughout the world, not only Middle Easterners but others, elect and as they do in this theocracy, this Islamic theocracy in Iran right now, they are sending you a message when they do this that in this case is clear and unequivocal. He has taken the most bloodthirsty, blood-curdling, Nazi-style judicial officer, and I put that in quotations, and he has made him the face of Iran to the world as the President, the puppet President to be sure. He has made that now known. He has told Joe Biden that. He has told the Europeans that. Why are we continuing to negotiate?

Why are we continuing to think that they are going to do anything other than what he says on – what he says? Non-negotiable on regional issues. What are the reasonable issues? The reasonable – regional issues, rather.

The regional issues are the death to the Israeli state, the support of Hamas, the support of Hezbollah, the support of organizations that seek to destabilize the region. He has told you that, Joe Biden. What are you doing?

Why can't you hear? It's so obvious. I don't understand it. Yeah, I mean, they continue to move forward this way. YouTube super chatter said, you know, Biden gave Russia the Nord Stream 2 pipeline even before he met with Putin. Iran now sees you can be rewarded even before you show up to negotiate. They have no reason to compromise.

None. Here's the issue. These world leaders, these countries are saying, you want to even have a meeting with us?

You've got to do this. I have a feeling that's where the Nord Stream 2 pipeline decision came through pre the Putin meeting. And the same with Iran. Iran has put all these preconditions out. And the U.S., by the way, right now is moving forward with those, providing sanctions relief.

The question will be is, do they lift sanctions on the new President of Iran, who is currently sanctioned by the U.S. government because of his role in mass murders? So, Wes, when you look at this, too, from just a projection of our strength, and then I want to update people to about tomorrow. We're going to get back into SR1 and this cloture move. And by the way, now Joe Manchin is interested in changing the filibuster from 60 to 55.

Question for me is, if you go from 60 to 55 and they give you everything you want in this plan and they take out all the stuff you didn't like, that's not much of a stretch to go to 50. So everything we were worried about Joe Manchin coming to fruition, but we're going to get into that tomorrow. I know we spent time on that on Friday's broadcast, but there's a big vote tomorrow to see if Joe Manchin provides that 50th vote, which it looks like he will. Then what happens next, which again could be very dangerous, and not just for SR1 and the voting bill, but also the filibuster itself, which again would change politics drastically on both sides of the aisle for as long as I can imagine into the future. But Wes, when you look at this decision and all these moves, it just seems like the world is telling us, they're sticking the finger in the eye. They're saying, we're going to put forth the worst people possible.

We're not going to try to hide our records at all. We're going to poison our political opponents like Putin. We're going to put in mass murders as our next President, like Iran's done. And we're going to see how you respond, and we look like we're begging.

Yeah, we do. You know, wishing for peace does not make peace come about. Wanting Iran, for example, to join the community of nations and act normally will not make that so. Unless the Biden administration changes course and changes some of their strategic calculus here, his legacy, Jordan, will be, when he leaves office, to have made the world a more dangerous place. Yeah, I mean, this is, again, it is already becoming a more dangerous place at a time when it is easy to not focus on what's happening around the world. The media is still threatening us for, will we have to lock down again? I mean, they're still throwing that out there. It's like they're so obsessed with that. Will we have to shut down again?

And this is why we're reopening. We need to pay attention to what's happening around the world. What the Biden team wants you to do is to not pay attention.

They would love you to tune out. That's why he doesn't do many press conferences. That's why he doesn't do a lot of speeches on these issues, because they don't want you to spend too much time paying attention to who they're actually dealing with. And in Iran's case, they are moving forward. If we believe the National Security Advisor, which I do, Jake Sullivan, who told Chris Wallace yesterday, they're going to move forward in these negotiations, even though Iran has elected a mass murderer who led death squads to kill nonviolent Iranian opponents of the revolution, thousands upon thousands.

And we're going to trust him with a nuclear deal. We'll talk to you tomorrow on Secular. 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