Biden Intel Confirms: Al-Qaeda’s Terror HQ based in Iran

Today on Sekulow, the US Defense Intelligence Agency confirms that Iran is housing Al Qaeda's terror headquarters while the Biden administration tries to relieve sanctions on Iran. We'll talk about that with former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

And now, your host, Jordan Sekulow. So the Defense Intelligence Agency, which is led by Lieutenant General Scott Barrier, he's the Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, which falls under the Department of Defense, issued their very thorough, really it's a worldwide threat assessment. And when you look into the assessment, you have to go to page 29 of 34 to find out about international transnational threats and terrorism. And the second group listed is Al Qaeda. And what is just put away in about one sentence is that overall, Amir Aman al-Zawahiri, who is now the head of Al Qaeda, is in hiding, while a handful of Iran-based Al Qaeda leaders oversee Al Qaeda's network. So Al Qaeda, what you take from that one simple sentence, buried away in the report, is Al Qaeda is being run out of Iran. Now, we were told time and time again, no, that can't ever happen because Iran is Shia, Al Qaeda is Sunni, they would never work together. But Iran is becoming the new headquarters, and it's been one before, but it's become the new headquarters to host these international transnational terror groups. Sudan's not a safe haven anymore, they overthrew Bashir. Afghanistan, not a safe place to go right now either. Even the Taliban's saying they don't want it to deal with, they don't want to be harboring these groups to bring about more attention on them in another war.

So who is doing it? Iran. But they're doing it at the same, this is the Biden administration putting this info out, acknowledging that we were all right, that Mike Pompeo was right, he was mocked back just in January for saying this. But he was right, we were right, and yet the Biden administration is moving forward with a plan to relieve Iran of economic sanctions that are linked to their work sponsoring international terrorism. The irony of all of this, of course, is when Al Qaeda was operating in Afghanistan and Pakistan, they had a hide and they had to operate in caves. Remember the shots of bin Laden all those years ago that were actually in caves in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Mahir, they're operating under the cover of protection from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

I mean, let that, you know, think about that. Now, CNN, not a conservative source, Barbara Starr, who's a good reporter, covers the Pentagon. This is what she tweeted out. Little noticed in the most recent DIA testimony, Ayman al-Zawahiri remains in hiding while a handful of Iran-based Al Qaeda leaders oversee Al Qaeda's network. Ten years since UBL killed, Iran shelters AQ leaders.

Let that sink in. Now, you let that sink in at the same time that she is calling for, and this is, I think, what's so critical here, she is calling for, or the Biden administration is calling for, reopen negotiations with the Iranian regime, which includes, let me tell you something, if you're dealing with the Iranian regime, you're dealing with the Revolutionary Guard. This shows you, Harry, the nature of their, the ridiculousness of what they're proposing under the Biden administration, and it's their intelligence. So, Iran has allowed Al Qaeda and other terrorists to come out of hiding and to operate openly in Iran. Iran follows the following mantra, that the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

And so, despite differences in theology, and perhaps differences in approach, one of the things that Iran sees quite clearly is that terror is helpful in advancing Iran's agenda, which includes its nuclear ambitions and its attack on Israel. So, folks, we're going to take your phone calls to this, 1-800-684-3110. That's 1-800-684-3110.

Mike Pompeo will be joining us in the second half hour of the broadcast, so we want to get your thoughts on this as well, 1-800-684-3110. And a big thank you to everyone who has made a financial contribution to the ACLJ during our matching challenge months in March and April. Thank you to all of you. It's how we do the work that we do.

We'll be right back on Secular. 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.

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I want to read this for you again. This is coming from the Defense Intelligence Agency. They issue a report last week. It's the statement for the right. It's the worldwide threat assessment.

I'm kind of buried away in it. I mean, it's a long assessment and it's comprehensive, but they go to the transnational threats of terrorism. They first talk about ISIS, but then for our purposes on this show, they get to Al Qaeda. And what they talk about is a clear sentence here.

I just want to read their first paragraph and then you'll focus in on the final sentence in that paragraph. Al Qaeda's appeal to Salafis. Jihadists has waned since ISIS emergence, and this dynamic is unlikely to change in 2021 during the past year. Counterterrorism pressures eliminated part of Al Qaeda's senior leadership. That's true.

The number two was taken out. Mike Pompeo would confirm that. But overall, Amir Eman al-Zawahiri, he's the leader of Al Qaeda right after Osama bin Laden was killed, is in hiding and a handful of Iran based Al Qaeda leaders. So not just Al Qaeda members, leaders oversee, so they are running Al Qaeda, all Al Qaeda's network that is going on inside Iran.

So I want you to understand that Iran is providing safe haven to Al Qaeda leaders to run Al Qaeda's network internationally while their main leader is in hiding, which could be there, but they're not just being protected. Listen to Mike Pompeo. He's going to be on the show the second half hour live. He's a senior counsel with us at ACLJ. But take a listen to a flashback.

This is back in January and people told him he was not correct on this. Take a listen. I would say Iran is indeed the new Afghanistan as the key geographic hub for Al Qaeda. But it's actually worse. Unlike in Afghanistan, when Al Qaeda was hiding in the mountains, Al Qaeda today is operating underneath the hard shell of the Iranian regime's protection. America has far less visibility on Al Qaeda's capabilities and their activities than we did on their activities when they were in Tora Bora or even in the mountainous regions of Pakistan. So that's the significant problem here. And I think that's the challenge that we face.

Wes Smith, the Colonel of the United States Army retired, is joining us by phone today. Wes, what's your reaction to this? You know, there were several things that stood out to me as I read the report from the Defense Intelligence Agency, and this is an annual report. They issue it every year, the threat assessment. But the thing that stood out to me, they said it is unlikely that Al Qaeda based in Iran would launch an attack in 2021 on the United States. Unlikely, Jay, is the operative word because this report is what the name implies. It's a threat assessment.

It is designed to be informative. Here are two things this report is not. It's not a definitive prediction of an attack on the homeland, but it is also not an assurance that such an attack will not happen. And the thing that just makes this so crazy, and I certainly agreed with what Mike Pompeo said a couple of months ago, not only, Jay, are we negotiating a flawed and strategically irrational agreement with Iran right now, the JCPOA. We're actually trying to renegotiate this agreement with a sworn enemy of the United States who is now harboring the group that launched the largest attack on the United States in our entire history.

I mean, think about that. Well, Iran also is denying that they're harboring anyone. I mean, they're certainly keeping to their operational motive, which is never tell the truth. But I think what Mike said, and we'll talk to him when he's on the broadcast in the second half hour, is Al Qaeda operating in wide open with the cover of the protection of the Iranian National Revolutionary Guard is significant. And then on top of that, you have the little John Kerry situation with, you know, him giving tip-offs to Zaref about Israeli intelligence moves. Although that's going on. Let's go to Washington and find out what's the latest on the John Kerry kerfuffle, which is being kind a lot more than that situation on his act of diplomacy.

I use that in quotes. Yeah, I mean, all of this ties together, Jay. I mean, look, Iran can deny this all they want. But you know who agrees with Secretary Pompeo on this? President Biden's own intelligence team. So if President Biden and the rest of the administration wants to turn a blind eye, they're going to have to turn it to their own advisers. Jay, I think it's important to point out to that this assessment was given to the Senate Armed Services Committee on the record.

And so we've got to ask that question. Where do the rest of the Senate stand on this? And Jay, you ask about the John Kerry situation. There are still multiple senators lining up for both calling for both his resignation and denying classified information. But I'll tell you this, Jay, you know who is overseas right now stumping for the Iran deal? Democrat members of the United States Senate. At least Chris Coons and Chris Murphy are over there still towing the administration's line on this.

It's really unreal. Yeah, I think that, again, what you have to focus in on here, everybody, is that this report, while it's one sentence, that sentence is very clear. And you put that in with what Mike Pompeo said. They're not having to hide in mountains to carry out their work and try to communicate. They're in a country that has sophisticated communications abilities. They are being protected by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

So since they're able to operate out in the open, I'm sure that they are secreted away to a sense. I'm sure Iran wants to keep tabs on exactly what they're doing. But the fact that Iran has made the diplomatic decision, the international decision, to harbor these leaders and allow them to run Al Qaeda from their country, providing them that safe haven in a much more technologically advanced country than in, like, you know, hiding out in a mountain. This is, I think it raises exponentially the threat level that Al Qaeda could pose, not just in 2021, but in the future because they're able to rebuild and reestablish themselves like what we're seeing in ISIS, which is mostly in Africa. So it's a very different ISIS than what we saw in the Middle East, but it's using that same kind of brutal tactics.

And then Al Qaeda, which is the smaller cell groups that usually plan more extravagant events, and they're able to recruit from a country using online technology much easier than recruiting from a cave in Afghanistan, where it's almost nearly impossible to use technology that way. So Harry mentioned this earlier, and I think it's worth talking about again, and that is this whole Sunni-Shia divide, which everybody said this, you know, the Sunni-Shia divide is what keeps these factions of Islam from working together. The fact of the matter is we now know that the Iranians have removed that divide. And how significant is that? I mean, I think it's very.

I think it's very, very significant. And it's important to note that Iran is quite willing to remove that divide so long as it advances its current interests, which is to bring terror essentially to the United States, to expand its nuclear ambitions, and to threaten Israel. So first, we should keep in mind that Iran is the leading state sponsor of terror. Second, we should keep in mind that Iran is one of the most duplicitous regimes in modern world history. And third, the Biden administration, after bringing stunningly low levels of energy and incoherence to the White House, has now opened U.S. borders to human trafficking, drug dealers, and to terrorists.

And we simply don't know who is crossing our border. So it's very, very important to note the Defense Intelligence Agency report, which suggests that Iran is working closely with terrorist organizations, they can come out of hiding, and they can expand their ambition, ultimately, I think, to threaten the United States and to threaten Israel. But of course, that's their plan. I mean, look, Israel is the enemy in the region, the little Satan in their view, where the United States is the great Satan. Now, having said all of this, I want you to understand that you have intelligence coming out of the Biden administration that is confirming that al Qaeda is operating in Iran under safe cover, safe haven. At the same time, the Biden administration is saying that they want to re-enter negotiations with the Iranian regime on the JCPOA.

So ask yourself, how do you do both? How do you allow the largest state sponsor of terror country, Iran, to provide safe harbor for a terror organization that has wreaked havoc around the world, including in the United States, and say we want to get into a negotiation with them? And at the same time, the former Secretary of State, now the, what is he, the environmental czar, the climate czar, and also a member of the National Security Council, you know, at some point along the way here was tipping off Zarif on intelligence matters regarding the Israelis' utilization of their military maneuvers. The idea is incomprehensible, but it's precisely what is happening. And that's why at the ACLJ, we get to the bottom of these things. We already have, as you know, a Freedom of Information Act request out. It will end up in court.

They will not respond appropriately. It will end up in court because that's where these end up. But we are going to fight back on this.

Yeah, that's right. And folks, we want you to stand with us. As always, go to ACLJ.org. That's ACLJ.org. And we want your thoughts, too.

You give us a call at 1-800-684-3110. You put your comments in on Facebook, Periscope, YouTube. We'll get to those as well. But I really encourage folks, this is something, again, it gets buried away. It's one sentence, but it is one key. That's why you read these reports, because it changes everything. So again, support the work of the ACLJ. And a huge thank you to everyone who participated in our March and April matching challenges.

Thank you for your donations. It's how we do the work that we can do. It's how Mike Pompeo is a member of the ACLJ team and will be joining us in the second half hour of the broadcast. 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. 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.

Welcome back to Secular. We are taking your phone calls at 1-800-684-3110. That's 1-800-684-3110. So the significance, again, of an administration whose intelligence agencies are telling the public, telling Congress, listen, Iran is Al Qaeda's home base. And that's a lot better of a home base to have than Afghanistan because a lot better to operate with the cover of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, the technology than it is to hide out in caves and try to recruit and carry out terrorist attacks. So now they are going to – Al Qaeda, I think, so long as they're inside Iran, is going to be able to utilize similar recruiting tactics to ISIS. They're going to be able to recruit online. They're going to have more access to the Internet, more access to data to turn people extreme. And I think that is where you have to focus in on because they're operating safely. They've got a place to place their money, their resources, and their assets.

So they're not hiding in caves. It's not Tora Bora. It's not Pakistan. As Secretary Pompeo said that we were wrong to believe that Shia Muslim power, Iran, and extremist Sunni groups that consider Shia heretics were bitter enemies. That's obviously not the case because Iran also supports Hezbollah and Hamas and, of course, Al Qaeda with the safe haven. This presents a real problem, though, for the United States because you can't – in what possible context could we want to get back into a negotiation fan and you've got members of the Senate out selling this right now in this situation when you know what they're up to?

Which is no good. Why would you possibly do this when your own intelligence tells you that they're harboring Al Qaeda? Jay, the answer to that is this is a decision that was made a decade ago. This is a decision that the Obama administration made a decade ago when Joe Biden was the vice President, and it's one that they are determined to follow through on no matter what the facts on the ground say. And, Jay, I know there's a temptation to say, look, this is something that only the administration is misguided on this, but I would tell you at two different times the United States Senate has enabled this action.

They did it when they passed the Iranian Nuclear Review Act and turned the requirement for ratification of a treaty on its head. And, Jay, they are doing it right now while Chris Coons and Chris Murphy are overseas with the Biden administration trying to assuage European partners that rejoining Iran is okay. So, look, the Biden administration is crazy.

I mean, people need to understand what this is, what you just said. We have members of the United States Senate currently overseas in Europe negotiating and talking with other foreign leaders to get them to join the JCPOA again, knowing now that their own, not the Trump administration intelligence, not some other third-party intelligence, but the Trump administration's intelligence. Biden administration. Excuse me, the Biden administration's intelligence is the one saying that Iran is harboring Al-Qaeda. I mean, you know, I'm not going to, I don't use words like treason. I'll use words like stupidity and ridiculous and putting Americans in harm's way.

For what? That's what I don't understand, fan. And at the same time, we have the John Kerry situation. Well, I just don't think there's any way to describe this, Jay, other than putting the interest of the largest state sponsor of terrorism ahead of the interests of the United States of America.

I mean, that's what it is. There's a desperation to achieve an alliance with Iran that is outpacing U.S. security interests. Because, Jay, in a vacuum, in a vacuum, right, a country that is harboring an entity with a long track record of hostilities and attacks on the United States, that would be the very last country you would be seeking an alliance with. But in this case, it's the very first one we're seeking an alliance with. I want to say something also about our team here at the ACL, Jay, because, again, thank you for your support in our March and April matching challenge.

We met our stretch goals, which we really appreciate. But we found that, again, this is a needle in a haystack. You find one line in these reports and all of a sudden you say, wait a minute, and then we're able to point it out and then we're able to take legal action. But, Harry, this is a very dangerous move here by the Biden administration to do this.

Absolutely. So the Biden administration prefers to disbelieve the evidence right before its own eyes. Iran is now the center of al Qaeda terrorism, and the Biden administration's defense intel agency confirms that. Notwithstanding these facts, which are right in front of our own eyes, the Biden administration's secretary of defense and the State Department, they continue, I think, to ignore this threat. Meanwhile, of course, Iran continues to increase the lethality, reliability, and survivability and accuracy of what? Its ballistic missiles in addition to expanding its terrorist footprint. And it continues to enrich uranium, posing a threat both to Israel and to the United States. But the Biden administration prefers to be spineless in the face of clear and unmistakable evidence.

Why? Because the Biden administration basically is filled up with individuals who are globalists who want to put the interests of other nations ahead of America's interests. And I think what we're seeing here is trying to utilize how Americans think. We see enemies, we beat our enemies, we move on, and then we acknowledge days like the September 11th attacks, we try to move on. So al Qaeda had seemed decimated.

They basically had been decimated. And then we had this new devil rise up in ISIS that then was decimated. Then the Iranian Revolutionary Guards leader was taken out by the Trump administration, as was the ISIS leader. Obama take out Osama bin Laden, even though Vice President Biden, by the way, was against that raid.

He's dead because of that. So we're seeing, unfortunately, what I think most Americans don't like to realize, which is that this threat of Islamic radical terrorism, which in the age of COVID and in the age of where there was Assyrians, the war there. So a lot of it was focused in the Middle East. And we had captured their leaders. We weren't seeing that same kind of radicalism here in the US.

We weren't seeing it even in Europe, Western Europe. I think we have to prepare again that if we don't do the work now, we're going to see that happen again. These Islamic radicals don't stop.

They don't change their belief system. Zawahir is only 69 years old. He's been the number two, and now he's the number one for a long time in al-Qaeda. He knows how to keep this organization moving.

In 2001, really, after the attacks, Osama bin Laden went into serious hiding. Yeah, and Zawahir was running it. So he was really running it.

The day-to-day operations were running it. The other one was more of a figurehead. So he's been running this for 20 years. Now, the Biden administration has the intelligence that Iran is harboring these individuals. Maybe not al-Zawahiri, but it could be others.

We know there's others. They've said it. You think maybe when you're sitting down on these ridiculous negotiations you're about to engage in, you say, you know what, before we sit down, we'd like you to get rid of the Iranian protection of al-Qaeda. But I guarantee you that's not even on their thought list.

No. That's the problem. And that's why, again, we're going to go to court, and we're going to find out about this whole John Kerry State Department cabal that was going on here. And hopefully there'll be some action taken in Washington, too, among the Senate. I'm holding my breath on that one. Michelle on YouTube, yes, she wrote, so we're going to give them another billion dollars on the tarmac.

Of course. Actually, they were thinking about seven billion. That was what was reported in the news over the weekend for a prisoner exchange.

Yes. Seven billion dollars. So not one billion in the tarmac. Another seven billion dollars. Inflation. That seems like the going rate. No, that's the going rate. Seven billion.

Yeah, they like seven billion. To talk to us and to get your prisoners back. We'll talk about that as well when we come back for this break. 1-800-684-3110. If you want to talk to us on air, remember, former Secretary of State, ACLJ team member Mike Pompeo joining us live in the second half hour to discuss this. Taking your phone calls at 1-800-684-3110. And a big thank you once again to all of you who donated during the month of March and April during those matching challenge months.

We hit our goals because of you. Thank you. 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. Live from Washington, D.C., Sekulow Live.

And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. So for those of you watching, I want to show you just what we're dealing with here and why this took a few days to come out. So here's the worldwide threat assessment. This is the Defense Intelligence Agency's worldwide threat assessment. They provide it to Congress. It's Lieutenant General of the U.S. Army Scott Bearer, who is the head of it. He's the director of the DIA.

And you go through. It's a 34-page report. And on page 29, they get into Islamic terrorism and transnational threats. They then focus in on al-Qaeda. And they talk about where al-Qaeda is focused right now.

This is the key. It's a key sentence that has led to this entire broadcast today. And a lot of people reporting that, hey, wait, people like Mike Pompeo were right about Iran, a Shia country, an extreme Shia country, working with an extremist Sunni Salafi group.

And people say, oh, no, that can never happen. It's the same John Kerry stuff. Like, if Jerusalem's the capital, then we recognize the capital that the Middle East will be on fire.

But this is the key sentence. Overall, Amir Imman al-Zawahiri – he's the leader of al-Qaeda – remains in hiding, while a handful of Iran-based al-Qaeda leaders oversee al-Qaeda's network. So while Zawahiri is in hiding, kind of like how bin Laden went into hiding after 9-11, a number – I mean, a handful is not two. So a handful of Iran-based al-Qaeda leaders – not operatives, not people associated with leadership – oversee al-Qaeda's network. Now, if you're a terror group, would you rather oversee a terror group inside Tehran or another major city in Iran where you can hide away, use technology, recruit online, use digital tools, have the protection of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and the Ayatollah himself? Or try and do that from a cave in Afghanistan where the Taliban may or may not turn you in?

So this has been a paradigm shift. First it was Sudan was the safe haven for al-Qaeda. Then it was Afghanistan. But now they've moved up a notch, I think, in their ability to – obviously you had Pakistan's role with bin Laden, but this is moving up a notch and they're giving them capabilities to act because they can act alongside the Revolutionary Guard against their shared enemies. This is not hiding in caves.

This is out in the open. This is protection by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. This is all happening at the same time that the United States is trying to negotiate with these terrorist state who's harboring terrorists. They're like a double terror state. And if you think about the reality of this, this is the one country in the region that can literally wreak havoc in the Middle East, Harry, is Iran.

It's the common enemy. That's what's joined the Israelis, the Gulf States, Saudi Arabia together is the Iranian threat. And the Iranians lead in the open with this in their protection of here al-Qaeda. It's like when the Turks are protecting Hamas. The Turks allow Hamas to operate out of Turkey. It's the same thing.

Absolutely. And so as I've said previously, Iran is the world's leading state sponsor of terror. The Iranian threat to the world, I think, is open and obvious to virtually everyone except members of the Biden administration. And so now Iran has engaged in an affirmative policy allowing terrorists to hide in plain sight. And the Biden administration is unwilling to do anything about it, apparently because it wants to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal. And as Jordan correctly points out, perhaps give the Iranians additional funding.

This makes no sense. And the Biden administration's policy again puts Iran first as opposed to putting American interests first. Remember, we're going to be joined by former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in the final segment of the broadcast today, but he's joining us live to talk about all of this, to talk about al-Qaeda, again headquartered now inside of Iran. And that is, again, just think about that for a minute because the Biden administration is not upping the sanctions on Iran when they found this. They're willing to take away the sanctions just to get it back to the negotiating table with Iran.

You think they'd be doing the opposite. We'll talk about that more when we come 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, 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. Music We're going to actually be finishing out the broadcast live with former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to really get into all this. He was at the forefront of warning the world. And they belittled him for it.

Oh, he was mocked by it. Oh, how could the Shias and the Sunnis, their hardline Shias in Iran, hardline Sunnis in Al Qaeda, how could they work together? Because they have a lot of the same shared enemies.

Right. So that's how they can work together. They need to read Sun Tzu's Art of War. And Iran is becoming what's to become like the leader of terror around the world, exporting terror around the world.

And so they've used groups like Hezbollah, which they basically 100% control, but they also are now going to dip their toes into letting Al Qaeda run outside of Iran, which is a step further than just Shia terror, now backing Sunni terror groups as well. You know, Harry uses the phrase these global elites, and it's true. These academics, these global elites, these career multi, I call them multi-administration State Department officials and Foggy Bottom have this view of the world. And, you know, we've seen this on the Republican side too, with some of the advisors, as if the world hasn't changed at all or isn't changing. And they scoff.

I'll never forget. I'm not going to give them the name of the person or the Presidential candidate, but it was a Republican. And one of the advisors, you and I were in the room and we were talking about the difficult, that Turkey is not the Turkey of Ataturk. It's not a secular state. It's a Turkey that is militant. It's a Turkey that's becoming more Islamic.

And this was years ago, 10 years ago. And it's a Turkey that's dangerous. And the foreign policy advisors to this Republican candidate for President laughed at us saying, you don't understand, you don't understand what's going on in Turkey. They're part of NATO.

Like that mattered. And it's the same, you know, globalist mindset with Iran. The Persian people are great people. The leaders are horrific.

Let me say it again. The Persian people, the Iranian people are great people. The leaders are horrific. And then you have United States senators stand out in Europe of all places trying to, you know, bring the globalist into this, you know, we got to love Iran and we'll give them a lot of money and maybe they won't be as dangerous. Jay, what you just described is a very common narrative in Washington, D.C. And the defense of it here is that, you know, we shouldn't be policing the world. And I would just challenge people when they hear that line. They probably agree with it, but Jay, it's a red herring argument because that's not at all what we're talking about.

This goes back to what Jordan and Wes were talking about. This is about whether or not we should prop up a terrorist regime to the tune of billions of dollars. We're not trying to police the world. We're not trying to install democracy in every corner of the world where it can't be installed. We are trying to decide whether the U.S. taxpayer, Jay, should be the ones funding attacks on them.

Don't let them have the argument that this is about policing the world. This is about propping a terrorist regime up. You know, Will, our producer, pointed out that the Obama administration failed, and Jordan, you were very active in this, failed to support the Iranian people when they were in Tahrir Square, in Tehran. And they were on the brink of a revolution. I mean, a real revolution. And it was the Obama administration that basically ordered them back into their houses and showed them no support.

No support. All the signs in English obviously were pointed to the West, trying to get the West's attention, and these people risking their lives, many who gave their lives, because it was the closest thing Iran has had since their 1979 Islamic revolution to overthrowing the Ayatollah. I mean, Iran was concerned, and if there was that U.S. nudge, not military, that U.S. nudge that the world seemed like if you were to isolate the government, you know, food rations, cripple their economy while those protests are going, that may have been the moment. But yet again, the Obama administration wanted to continue to work with the Ayatollah and the leaders inside of Iran. Iran's got a Presidential election coming up in June.

Their Presidents are usually, again, these are figureheads because there is a religious dictator who runs the state with his own council and his own military. But it is a key to see where Iran is going to see what candidates are even allowed to run, and are they going to replace a Rouhani type with someone who's more similar to Ahmadinejad. I think there's been a move to see Zarif, someone like that in that position, but then there was that whole leak which was to damage him inside of Iran. A lot of people said, why are you believing in Iranian intel leaks? That wasn't Iran doing that to promote, to hurt the U.S. That was Iran trying to hurt, I think, Zarif and to expose him for who he is, which is somebody who has no idea what's going on in the world and just has a good command of the English language. You know, Ellie Lake for Bloomberg in 2016 wrote an article titled, Why Obama Let Iran's Green Revolution Fail, colon, The President Wanted a Nuclear Deal, Not Regime Change.

Harry? Absolutely. So the Obama administration presents an enormous contrast with the Trump administration. So while the Trump administration has expanded sanctions on Iran, again, the world's leading state sponsor of terror, global elites, particularly within the Obama administration and now within the Biden administration, would rather not enforce any sanctions. Instead, they would like to remove them in their headlong rush to do what? To reenter the Iran nuclear deal, which basically was a failure before it was ever written, because it does not stop Iran from realizing its nuclear ambition. In fact, at the end of the day, it accelerates Iran's capacity to gain a nuclear weapon, because if you remove sanctions, if you provide funding, guess what? Iran will use those funds to build up its nuclear arsenal. It will use those funds to build up its ballistic missiles, and it will use those funds to support terror. So this policy makes no sense. It is consistent with the incoherence of the Biden administration. Mercy on YouTube said, so Al Qaeda's bases are in Iran, and yet John Kerry was sharing secrets with the Iranian appeasing all our enemies. Yeah, think about that for a minute. Again, you've got this appeasement approach.

We can work together. Somehow this is going to benefit the United States. What benefit does this bring to the United States? This Iran deal did not prevent Iran getting involved in Syria, did it? It didn't stop them from backing Assad. The whole rest of the world was still in the deal, and they were engaged with a government that was using chemical weapons on its own people. It didn't prevent them. It didn't prevent them from sending Hezbollah in to fight this trilateral war with ISIS and other groups inside Syria and with the loss of life so massive. It allowed them to do that. It gave them the green light, because it gave them the cash.

They had the money, the resources. If you give Iran an open market, which is what removing the sanctions does, and any kind of pallets of cash, they take that and they put it right back into their military, right back into their exploitation of terror. We're taking your phone calls, 1-800-684-3110.

That's 1-800-684-3110. I mean, I would think Washington's response to this is, are we finally going to think differently at the State Department now that our own intel is telling us to? Well, they certainly should, Jordan.

I don't have any confidence that, at least on the Democrat side, that's going to be the response. I mean, I look at the fact that John Kerry got caught linking information to Zarif, and now he is calling, Zarif is calling this information from the Biden intelligence team warmongering lies, Jordan. So clearly, that is an individual that we should not have been trusting to do negotiations with, and yet it's members of the United States Senate that are now doing the heavy lifting overseas on behalf of the Biden administration to restart this.

It's just absolutely amazing. Jordan, I would make one other point on the humanitarian one. When the Iranians were in the streets, yes, it was the Obama administration that told them to go inside, but ultimately, what was it that pushed the Iranians away from the negotiating table? It was the dollars that we gave them.

It was the dollars that we gave them that eased that pressure. It's like you do the same thing all over again and expect a different result, which is the definition of, like, insanity, okay? So, I mean, the same team's back in play. The same operators are back in play. They just got promoted from the State Department to now to the White House, so they're more dangerous. But I'm going to tell you something.

At the American Center for Law and Justice, Secretary Pompeo is going to be on our senior council for global affairs and be on in just a moment after this break. I'm going to tell you something. That's why your support of the ACLJ has made such a huge difference, because we're not just – we're giving you great analysis and you need it because we need to be an informed citizenry. But we are taking action to find out what the heck was going on with all of these shenanigans. And we're going to get to the bottom of it.

It may take a year. Got to litigate it. But it's like that one line in the report.

That's all you need is the one line. That's why your support of the ACLJ is always so critical. Yeah, and again, a huge thank you. I'm going to use today because we were up to the matching challenge until Friday at midnight. A huge thank you to all of you who donated in the month of March and April, those back-to-back matching challenge months. I want to just thank everybody out there, because I know the country is still not really reopened, and depending on where you are, you're at different levels of that reopening. But those of you who were financially able to do it, you donated to the ACLJ, setting records even during a pandemic, and we appreciate so much your financial support. It's why, in the next segment – it's not a guest, it's an ACLJ Senior Counsel for Global Affairs, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. It's why we can add to the team and broaden out the work, what we bring you each day here on radio, but also what we do behind the scenes, the work that you don't see during this broadcast.

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ACLJ.org. Welcome back to Sec Hill. We are joined now by our Senior Counsel for Global Affairs, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Mike, I want to go to this. This In the Defense Intelligence Agency report on worldwide threats. They focus in on al-Qaeda, and they say in that one sentence on page 29 of 34 of the report, Overall, Amir-Eman al-Zawahiri remains in hiding while a handful of Iran-based al-Qaeda leaders oversee al-Qaeda's network. We have focused in, Mike, on the specifics there, that it's not talking about a handful of just random al-Qaeda people, but al-Qaeda leadership running al-Qaeda with the protection of Iran, with the capabilities that they would have inside of Iran.

And as you pointed out, that's very different than capabilities inside a hiding out in a cave in a mountain. So for quite a while, the United States has known that the senior operational leadership was in the hands of leaders that had fled Afghanistan. Frankly, the AfPak border, because of work that the United States did, we pushed them off the X, and they found safe haven in Iran. And while this has been going back and forth for a while, the Iranians have now moved to a place where they are permitted to be the operational leaders. The nominal leader of al-Qaeda, Zawahiri, still remains technically in charge. But make no mistake about it, today the Iranians, the Iranian regime harbors the al-Qaeda senior leaders that are responsible for the global jihad, the global operations of al-Qaeda. You know, this is Jay, Mike, and one of the things that's interesting here is that, and we've seen this before, I've often said, and we did a documentary on it a number of years ago, that Iran is the greatest exporter of state-sponsored terrorism in the world. Now they have a state, an operating entity, al-Qaeda, operating under their protection.

By the way, the BBC said you'd said this, and you had no evidence of it, of course, now they're having to retract all that evidently. But does this escalate the terror capabilities that Iran has? Because, as you just said, if they're under Iranian protection, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard has a huge influence. So look, the Iranians were prepared to host them because it provided assurances for the Iranians. The Iranians could, in fact, say, if you operate from here, you can't allow attacks inside of Iran. You know, people have been confused because al-Qaeda, obviously a Sunni enterprise, the Iranians a Shia terror organization, but this is really straightforward. When the little Satan of Israel or the great Satan of the United States is the threat, they are prepared to work together to coordinate, to do all of the things that they can do to spread their terror. And your point is well taken. This is operating inside a very powerful nation, a country.

It is different from someplace where you're out in the middle of nowhere doing your best to extract resources from the land. They're operating in a major urban area, a major protected environment, and with the capacity for the Iranian regime to provide them the infrastructure and support they need to spread their terror around the world. You know, I want to go back to the fact that the world doesn't seem, Mike, to want to acknowledge this. It's in our own government, too. So we now, their own intel, it's not you saying it, it's not the Trump administration intel, their own intel and defense intelligence agency is telling everybody negotiating with Iran right now in the Biden administration. They're providing a safe haven and a much more sophisticated safe haven to al-Qaeda's leaders, giving them a chance to rebuild, a new way to utilize technology and recruit, unfortunately, and to spread their terrorism to kind of reboot.

A new kind of al-Qaeda, if you will, in a much better place, protected by the Revolutionary Guard. And yet I feel like they're going to ignore this entirely and go moving full steam ahead with any kind of negotiations. I mean, there was talk about $7 billion for a prisoner swap. That was on the table, the U.S. denying it, Iran saying no, it was confirmed. But I mean, this seems to be a pattern that we're re-entering that we saw in the Obama years, but it's on like a fast-forward track in the Biden years.

It's the darndest thing, Jordan. So you have this knowledge, you have the Biden defense intelligence agency talking about this terror, this al-Qaeda terror leadership inside of Tehran. And you have the administration saying that they are prepared to lift terror sanctions on the Iranians in exchange for a deal that has already largely been shown to be ineffectual. It is almost unexplainable to think about how someone could see that making sense, how an average American could stare at the terrorists from the Iranian regime knowing that they're harboring al-Qaeda's most senior terror operators and say, oh, goodness, the United States decision today is to lift terror sanctions on these folks.

It's befuddling, to say the least. I was going to ask our policy director, Harry Hutchinson, who's here with me right now. You know, it seems, following up with the secretary just said, it seems that the policy, lack of policy here is dramatic in the Biden administration.

Absolutely. And my intuition is that the Biden administration simply does not wish to put American interests first. They don't really care about average working men and women in the United States. They want to put forward the ideas that come from global elites, from high tech companies. And basically, as Secretary Pompeo notes, they want to re-enter a deal with Iran, despite the fact that Iran has never fully complied with the prior deal. And so it makes no sense to hand more money to a terrorist organization. And Mike, following that up, and you got Zarif last week saying that, hey, he's just a diplomat in the diplomatic corps. You know, we don't have the influence because the Revolutionary Guard really has the influence here.

So we're just kind of, you know, functionaries. So why would you sit down and negotiate with these people? We always said we're happy to talk with whoever the Iranians put forward, but they have to be someone with the capacity to actually be a decision maker, someone who can speak on behalf of the only person that really matters in the regime. And that is the Ayatollah. And what you can see from the release of the tapes, even the foreign minister himself acknowledges he's a bit player.

He's a fancy suit. He's an English speaking chill for the terror regime. And to sit down with his team, the foreign ministry team that works for Zarif will likely lead you to talking to someone who's going to have to go back and check with HQ.

And if HQ doesn't like what they see, they're going to reject the deal. It is odd to set up a conversation with people who actually can't represent the country or the regime that they purport to represent. It seems like, Secretary Pompeo, they are having some difficulty with the leak of the audio of Zarif, and then you've got elections coming up there in June, that maybe this isn't happening as fast for the Biden administration.

It's just not looking as good on paper. There's more reporters on this. But do you see this administration in any sense, or is it like the Obama administration, deal, we don't really care about anything else, we just want to say we got a deal? Or do you think there is a chance that if we keep this pressure up, and this news that keeps coming out, and this intel reports that come out from their own intelligence, from the US intelligence, that there is a way to prevent the Biden administration from getting into this deal again with the devil?

Jordan, they're pretty wedded to it, and they seem moving that way headlong. But it's important that ordinary Americans, working class people all across the country, understand the risk that they're putting the United States in. They need to understand, for those of us who understand the central nature of our relationship with Israel and to protect the Jewish homeland, they need to understand the risk that's there. So it is vital that we talk about this in a way that the American people can understand, and so they will urge their representatives, Republican or Democrat, to urge the administration not to once again go down a path, which creates a simple way for the Iranians to ultimately end up with not only a nuclear weapon, but a broader nuclear program as well. You know, to have a former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on to discuss just this, because he was leading the way when he came out and said this, and in January, again, was mocked for saying this, knew the intel, now the intel is confirming it. Thank you, Secretary Pompeo, for joining us, and folks, as always, that because of your support these last two months, too, with the matching challenge, I want to say thank you, because it's why we were able, we're brainstorming, we're able to bring on people like Secretary Pompeo to the ACLJ team. It's because of you, the ACLJ, now more than ever, we'll talk to you tomorrow. Become a member today. ACLJ.org.