Justice Alito Exposes "Concerted Effort" to Take Down SCOTUS

On today's show, we cover Justice Alito exposing a concerted effort to take down the Supreme Court of the United States. Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments.

For call one eight hundred six eight four three one one zero. And now, your host Logan Sekulow. Welcome to Sekulow. This is Logan Sekulow. Will Haynes in studio.

Rick Cornell is going to be joining us a little bit later. Look, in a new world we live in, you get to hear a lot more from Supreme Court justices, and I think it's about time actually that the American people get to spend a little more time, a little more personal time with the Supreme Court justices, as of course they are deciding the laws of the land.

Now, of course, this comes also at a time where just a few years ago, a lot of them were being doxed and threatened and terrorized due to a leaked opinion.

Something that really had not happened in a very long time, or not to this this level, had really ever happened. It happened to be one of the most sensitive topics. Of course, it was the overturning of Roe v.ersus Wade.

So, we are going to discuss that at length because you had Justice Alito. Appearing on the Shannon Bream Sunday Morning shows on Fox News and laying down some truth, had a lot to say. It was actually very interesting to hear him talk about things, and again, unprecedented that we would actually hear. A direct response to a lot of the issues that came up, whether it was the leak, whether it was the death threats that came upon him, whether he's going to be retiring. These are questions that you typically would like to hear in an interview, but you don't often, maybe just due to the privacy that has always been the case for Supreme Court justices.

That has changed dramatically in a few years, as now we know that they're broadcast. The time limits are different. A lot of things have changed in the Roberts Court, and we're going to discuss a lot of that. Of course, the unmaking of the Supreme Court. Discuss that as well.

Whether you will have a packing the court situation, what it could look like in the future, and his concern that there is an effort, a specific effort, to take down the Supreme Court as we know it. That's right.

So, why was he even giving these interviews?

Well, these are the type of interviews you normally get at a time like this because he has a new book out. Of course.

So it's called "So Ordered: An Originalist View of the Constitution." The court and the country. What is different, though, is that he is going beyond just what's in the in the you know book itself, and going a little bit expand. Like sit down with the book people that no one wants to watch. They go over very specific details of what's in the book, which is usually kind of vague. It's usually not like this.

It's almost more like a weirdly Supreme Court self help. Right. I feel like it's not like let's get into it. But this this was a very different tone. That's right.

And he also.

So he went on CBS, and we're going to play a lot of that sound. But I think this is one that caught our eye because you have to also think about where we are contextually. Today is the first day of the new Supreme Court term. Many people speculated he was going to retire at the end of last term, first Monday, and he did not. That's right.

So first Monday in October, but we're also Away from a little ways away, just a few weeks away from the first Tuesday in November, which is the midterm elections, where you are seeing an insurgent party trying to make a part of their redoing of the the power base in this country is redoing the Supreme Court. That is a part of the plan. If they first get the midterms and then eventually they take the executive branch, you know that the Democrats want to redo this and. Let's play. This is Justice Alito, Bite Six from just yesterday.

There has been a concerted effort to intimidate the court and justices on the court to try to influence us to decide cases differently from the way in which we have been deciding them, and I am concerned about the future of the court. Just saying, he's concerned about the future of the court. Why? Because they're being intimidated. Whether that's from the inside, whether it's from the outside, from social media, from people surrounding their homes, trying to get them to vote in a way that's different than not only what their conscience says, but what they believe the rule of law should be.

Again, this has not been a court. As much as people want to push, saying this is a conservative court, this is a Trump court. How many times have you all been on my chat, mad at us, and mad at the Supreme Court of the United States? Or how many times has President Trump been mad at the Supreme Court of the United States for not voting in his way? But they're worried about being bullied, and bullied beyond.

Just like oh, we hope they vote one way. We're talking about people surrounding their homes, death threats, fire bombs—all of these things that are happening, that happened in real time, and I'm sure are still happening, from the smallest to the biggest. We're going to discuss it all and a lot more. What do you think about the future of the Supreme Court of the United States? Do you even care?

One eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. Welcome back to Secular. We do have some phone lines open for you at one eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. Talking about Justice Alito making the rounds, making some appearances, of course, on Fox News, on Shannon Bream, and some other options as well. But Shannon Bream, of course, attorney who has been knows a whole lot about the Supreme Court of the United States.

Has obviously been involved quite a bit. Asked some really good and tough questions of Justice Alito, and he did not. Seem phased, nor did he seem to try to move the goalpost or change the answer. He took it head on, and look, some of the answers, quite frankly, are sad and a little scary. But that is what we're headed into.

If you have the remaking of the Supreme Court of the United States, which is what we know a lot of people want to see, and of course they only want to see that right now, as it feels like it's more conservative leaning. If they were in control, if the if the liberal justices were in control, of course, how dare!

Someone suggests this. It's a game of politics. You know whether you've seen the inside of of the Republican Party, you've seen the inside of the Democratic Party. A lot of it is very dirty. We know this.

We know politics can get gross. But we also know you now have the ability to rile up individuals, human beings who maybe are already off, are already susceptible to manipulation. And it brings protests to the doorsteps of Supreme Court justices. It brings attacks. It brings assassination attempts.

All of this is real. And it's real because why a group of Supreme Court justices decide that they have a point of view that they don't share necessarily with another portion of of the United States of America.

Something that I don't know just exists in normal commonplace. But I think we should hear this is kind of how it started.

Some of the conversation with Shannon Bream and Justice Alito, and I want to hear from you your thoughts on this as we head into the midterms. How much does the Supreme Court of the United States matter to you? Two years out from a President. Candidate or from a new President of the United States, they're going to likely decide just based on the age and where people are. They are likely going to decide another couple of Supreme Court justices at least.

Does it weigh into your vote? I know it's been something we pushed here for a long time. It always feels like it's a wall. Feels like that it's something you guys understand, but you don't necessarily always care about. But now you have the other side, maybe the more liberal side, spending more time talking about the Supreme Court of the United States, and I still feel like we don't in the conservative side.

Phone lines are open for you at one eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. The let's hear from Shannon Bream and Justice Alito by one. Groups on the left now saying it's time to reform the court. They need to either add justices. You guys need to be term limited.

There needs to be an age limit. Do you all discuss those when they come up publicly? We do not discuss it. I am concerned about that. There has been a concerted effort to intimidate the court and justices on the court, try to influence us to decide cases differently from the way in which we have been deciding them.

And I am concerned about the future of the court. I think it's an important institution. It has not always done the right thing, but I think on the whole, it has been fundamental in protecting our constitutional structure and the rights that all Americans enjoy. And when you hear that answer, based off the context in which Shannon Bream set it up, about it wasn't are you you know feeling like people are trying to intimidate it through threats of violence, which we know has been happening. He even goes on to talk about the the death threats and the assassination attempts that have happened, and with his colleague Brett Kavanaugh, but also ones that have happened against other colleagues that they don't talk about as much.

And you can understand if that was just all the answer was, but he's taking. It a step further by responding to her question about left groups on the left saying it's time to reform the court, or that they need to add justices or term limit the justices. And his response is there is a concerted effort to intimidate the court and justices on the court to try and influence us to decide cases differently from the way in which we've been deciding them. He is saying that even that. Is an intimidation tactic, trying to say like, well, if you keep doing this, we're just going to make you irrelevant.

We're going to add justices. We're going to make you have to leave the court by capping the age. That he sees even that as an intimidation tactic. And when you even think back to like, where did a lot of this start? We we saw it in the break video.

If you're watching on YouTube or Rumble or Facebook or wherever you watch, but if you were on radio, you may not have heard this. We've played. It for years, but this was, I don't know, someone who hopes to be the next majority leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, on the steps of the Supreme Court, calling out new justices based off of what they were anticipating the overturning of Roe v. Wade. This is Byte Nineteen with Chuck Schumer giving this very distinct threat.

I want to tell you, Gorsuch. I want to tell you, Kavanaugh. You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won't know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions. Yeah, again, the exact moment where they are specifically told, "Don't go forward with the decisions that you feel like are correct, you feel like uphold the law of the United States of America." If you don't go with us, you will unleash the whirlwind.

Of course, let's ask him, Chuck Schumer. How do you feel about term limits, Chuck Schumer? How do you feel about age limits, Chuck Schumer? You're in your mid seventies. You've been around for quite some time.

Of course, if the shoe was on the other foot, you'd have the exact opposite of a reaction because that's how Washington rolls. It doesn't matter as long as it's pushing your agenda forward. It doesn't matter if people's lives are threatened. It doesn't matter if kids are having to be put under protection because you know you have decided to. Essentially, rile up a base, and I'm very proud of Justice Alito for going on these news sources and talking so openly.

It is what we need more of in the United States of America. I think we do need to hear from these Supreme Court justices. They they don't need to be shadowy figures anymore. You know, they don't need to be ones where you know the idea that you can't have cameras in the court, that kind of thing. I I can get that some ways, but if we're gonna start live streaming the audio.

Why can't we see it? Why haven't we gone that far? I think the American people deserve it. If you are going to be doing this, if you are going to already take these first steps, there is no reason why we can't have a couple camera people in there showing what's happening. There is no reason why we can't have a better response to when people complain about the Supreme Court of the United States.

And again, we're pushing forward. We're pushing forward when it comes to the way technology is going to be involved. They've already changed how the court runs and operates right now.

So the idea of adding extra justices, though it's a scary thought, and I know what the thought process is from the other side. Don't like laugh it off. It will be something that's going to come up, depending on what you know, who you have controlling the government in the next couple months, and then in the next couple of years.

Well, right, and I think that that is part of this first step for those that want to, as they say, reform the court. And in reality, it's make it in their own image. They will say pack the court, though. Oh, right. That's what I'm saying.

Without even like. I mean that sounds like something that you would only do if you were manipulating a system, if you were trying to create a fraudulent government. You would say words like "pack the court," but they openly do. That's right.

And when you you know that that is their goal, you know the types of of candidates that they're running that are all on board with this idea. You're even hearing, you know, Kamala Harris, who's going around campaigning for individuals, saying that as well. And you know that she's looking at running for President. Again, so all of these things factor in that this midterm election is their first step at that goal, and I think this is one of their biggest goals. They talk about you know President Trump's made it the affordability crisis and all these things in their campaign speeches, but I think when you get to the heart of it, many people this is their goal is to change the Supreme Court.

So then, anything else they do. They can get through with ease, and that there will be no real check on their legislative and executive power. When they they always try to say, you know, the President's trying to be a king, or or all these things that that you see Congress doing when it's the Republican majority. It always seems like they want to do what they accuse their opponents of doing, and I think that's what you'd see here if they win in November. With the majority in the House and the Senate, which is looking like it could be a sweep for the Democrats in both.

Now, even Vice President Vance kind of said that this weekend, sort of. Hey, you know, it's not looking good. Numbers are not trending well. But that puts them in a really good position for the next Presidential cycle, when they could get all of that done. It's the long game, but not that long—four years total.

Where the not even that, two more years from this cycle is when they could start. That done, if they are able to take back both houses of Congress and then win the presidency in 2028, so it's a it's a wild time, and to even hear the Supreme Court Justice himself speaking about that, that is where it does. It seems like these politicians are trying to intimidate the court of saying we are going to completely get rid of you and change the way that this is done if you don't go along with us. And look, we're going to get into the next segment how the ACLU is involved because. The Supreme Court, United States.

The term starts today. It's always the first, you know, Monday in October. Here we are. We have eleven cases currently pending. I got a list of them before the Supreme Court, before the justices.

I'm going to break down those when we get back.

Some of the most important ones. Obviously, all are important, but some of the ones that are more vital. What's happening right now? Because the ACLU, we're always in front of the Supreme Court, United States, in many different ways. And I need you to support the work.

You know, we're A lot of organizations come in here, complain. They'll come and they'll talk about what's going on, but we actually get the work done, and we're in front of the Supreme Court of the United States every year. But this time, we got 11 potential cases in front of the Supreme Court of the United States this term.

So I want you to be a part of it today. Because these stakes couldn't be higher. If you want to join with the ACLJ, make a donation today at aclj.org. Again, if you're not already a monthly supporter of the ACLJ, become an ACLJ ACLJ champion. That's at aclj.org/champion.

It's some of the gifts every month. Of course, you can cancel anytime, and it is tax deductible. But our attorneys—they're working day and night. To help defend your liberty, and we need your support.

So again, go to aclj. dot org. And some phone lines are still open for you. And I want to hear from you at one eight hundred six eight four three one one zero. Be right back.

Welcome back to Sekulow. Phone lines are open. One eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. Again, the United States Supreme Court is where the ACLU always shines, and we have eleven current situations pending cases where we have filed in.

Some are our cases; some are also associated with. Again, eleven.

So, when the Supreme Court term starts today, understand how important it is for our team here because they are actively working. Our offices in Washington, D.C., are directly across from the Supreme Court of the United States. I mean that is where the work is getting done. We have a couple different major offices and major hubs. Of course, that is where our legal headquarters is and will be in Washington D.C.

Phone lines are open for you at one eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. I want to take actually one of these calls and then we're going to go through some of these cases. Let's go to Cliff, who's an ACLJ champion. Don't want him to wait too long. Cliff, you're on the air.

Well, thanks for taking my call. Listen, I'll be brief, but like I had told the screener, I believe. That what what what you're hitting at is having it more transparent for the Supremes and having it televised. I agree wholeheartedly. I think that would bring more integrity back and honesty.

But but it can't be censored like the pool, you know, the pool, like with traveling with the President or or not being able to show his speech when he's addressing the nation. To be censored or or not even shown or or having somebody commenting over what's actually being done, I think a live feed and just listening would bring more integrity and openness, and people can see actually what's happening. Of making the sausage, in a way, yeah. Hey, Cliff. I mean, I think a lot of people don't even know this that as of the justice court, basically after COVID, I believe.

They went to live streaming the audio of what's happening inside Supreme Court United States. No video yet. Again, baby steps. It feels like you know, in the IRS asked you to tack or to fax in your information. It's baby steps here, but I do think that that's that was a big move.

It was a controversial move, but you do have the news occasionally now playing clips.

Now you were always able to get the audio recordings later on. That afternoon, typically, yeah, they're usually not live streamed.

So I don't know what the technological barrier would be to then just throwing up a camera, and why that would matter at this point, except for the way maybe the Supreme Court justices want to look, and the way that the the lawyers looked, and maybe some ethical reasons you don't want that.

However, we already are making that step forward.

So yeah, if there's going to be transparency, if the Supreme Court justices are going to be doing media rounds, if they're going to be doing all of this, and you're wanting to protect the integrity of that court, maybe in some ways to protect the integrity of the court, you need to showcase. That there is integrity in the court, people need to be able to see it.

Now, again, you are right. We're going to have to have make sure that mainly people are pushed towards a full uncensored live stream because they will take bits and pieces.

Now, Supreme Court justices are all pretty smart, typically. When they're speaking, they are asking a lot of questions. They're not necessarily arguing the merits during that moment. They're doing that behind closed doors.

So you'll have some gotcha moments, but it's a little bit more rare in terms of gotcha on the Supreme Court justice, and more on the lawyer. Arguing the case—that's right—and I think one that that's something that especially you and I we we like more media accessibility for things and not just like media as in a news outlet, but the actual physical thing—the media, the the film, the video that we could be able to to see and to explain. I think it would also give people a better sense of what actually goes on there. Typically, I mean, not typically—the only way you know what an oral argument looks like. From the Supreme Court, in reality, is to go attend.

Yeah, yeah, not a reenactment or some sort of television show, like a real. There aren't video presentations of this. Most people, again, probably have an idea of what it could look like, but maybe not even. And even like photography of the inside is is very rare. There are some during a case, right?

Oh, definitely not. I mean, just of what the inside of the courtroom looks like. It's not constantly being updated photographs that you see. Oh, there's a new one. That's a new angle, but But I mean, I don't know if a lot of changes are going on.

I don't know if it's like an Apple Store. That's fair.

Well, I mean, who's to say? When was the last time you went to the Apple Store? No, not the Apple Store. The Supreme Court. A couple years.

Right? They could have made it. For all we know, it looks like the Hague now. Yeah. Right?

Because we don't see it. But we can watch it in Apple Vision Pro though.

Now we can watch it in virtual reality and just sit and rivet. Riveting.

Now to say a lot of people do watch court procedurals on YouTube. It's a huge topic on YouTube. Right. People watch this, so it not like it would not have an audience. It certainly would have an audience.

So you know what? I think let's move forward with that. Why not? If you're gonna again sit with some of these Supreme Court justices and we're gonna spend more time with them, we might as well open this up a little bit more.

Now again, is it tradition? No. But neither is packing the court. And that is what is wanted here, and I think. Remember also that was a failed effort by FDR to pack the court to get his way, and it's been widely criticized throughout American history, modern American history.

Until now, you had Ruth Bader Ginsburg even saying that was a terrible idea. That the number of nine she thinks is the right one. But it also shows you how ideologically someone that was a figurehead of the left of the leftist jurisprudence, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, was someone who was saying we need to keep this number. And you would think that she would be widely criticized if she said that today. I mean, it's a different.

It was a different time. You could completely disagree with what Ginsburg did. You completely disagree with what a lot of these justices did. But they were legitimate scholars of their time. Even if you disagreed with them, they weren't into the political nonsense that is now just corrupted everything.

That's right, and I think also, as you mentioned earlier, we are still hard at work with this court. Yeah, yeah, we need to go through this. And one thing is that we have eleven that we have filed that are amicus briefs, plus two pending that we hope are taken by the court of of our clients as well. You've heard us talk about them, John Eastman's case, where. He has been disbarred in California, as well as the Calvary Chapel case, and one important one that we have also filed in is Saint Mary's Catholic Parish versus Roy.

That will be heard in December of this term. This case, and why it's so important that we filed here is that on on the face of it, if you read what the case is about, it doesn't seem very connected to, like, say, the Calvary Chapel case, where the You know, COVID fines were are still being trying to be enforced against them, but when it gets down to the the real legal arguments of it, there are parts of this case that could very much affect the Calvary Chapel case. And we we see people all the time saying, "Hey, where's the Calvary Chapel case? What's going on?" It's we can only speculate because we don't know. But the fact that they did not either grant or deny cert at the end of that term, last term, and held it over.

Gives us a reasonable assumption or belief that there's something else that they want to see or decide before getting to that, and it very much could be this St. Mary's Catholic Parish.

Now, obviously, this is speculation. This is not something from the court that they've said. Here's why we've held it over. It's an interesting case, but and so that's why we also had to file in this one to make sure that we are still pushing those arguments forward. Yeah, in that case specifically, it's essentially in Colorado saying that.

If they want to particularly decide that they would like to have someone who is I don't matches their religious beliefs of the school, that they could not go above that. They could not decide that that was a deciding factor. They actually removed the state removed congressional. Congregational, I'm sorry, congregational preferences. Though they could still have something like your siblings went there, that kind of thing.

But it became your beliefs. They decided that was something you couldn't do again for a religious school and religious institution.

So it's interesting how the ACLU can get involved in that. There's a lot more too. Look, we only have 57 seconds, so we're not going to get to all these right now. We'll do it when we get back from the break. And if you don't catch us on the full hour on your local station, what are you doing?

Watch on aclj.org, watch on YouTube or on Rumble on Facebook. Way more fun. You get to see us. You get to talk to us. You get involved in the chat.

We do it each day, every day, live from 12 to 1 p.m. Eastern Time. Maybe you join us later on, tape delayed, or you know, whatever it may be in your local market, because some areas air us later, you know, with time zones. Maybe they put us on in the afternoon slot, and we are recording this. You know, again, 12 to 1 p.m.

Eastern Time is when we are doing this show. I want you to be a part of the live broadcast each and every day. But even if you're not, I want you to support the work. Catch the full hour, regardless, because it's archived. Immediately following the show, that's at YouTube, on Rumble, on aclj.org.

You can find us all the way there. Go back to me. Let's cut back to me. Look, if you want to support the work of the ACLJ, I'm going to ask you right now. It is important time.

Eleven pending cases at the Supreme Court. Be a part of them today at aclj.org. Back in less than a minute. Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow.

And now your host, Logan Sekulow. Welcome back. Second half hour of Sekulow. Rick Grinnell's gonna be joining us in just a few minutes. You're not gonna want to miss that.

And phone lines are open for you at one eight hundred six eight four three one one zero. We're also gonna be talking about the U.S. pulling away all the bombers from that base in the U.K. as there have been more terror plots found and discovered.

So we're gonna talk about that. Where things exist, we'll talk about that with Rick when we get back. But of course, we are talking about the first Monday in October. It is. The first Supreme Court hearings, of course, this year.

The new term begins today, and the ACLJ we're involved in eleven current pending Supreme Court cases right now. We're going to talk about those as we go up, and of course, we were also discussing Justice Alito making the the press rounds. And really, laying out the fact of talking about his retirement—it's something that people have been pushing for. And look, when people ask about that, of course, there's a lot of conversation around term limits and a lot of conversation around age limits. I think with the Supreme Court of the United States, I don't think that should be ever considered.

I think there are other—you could talk about it in the Congress and Senate. You could talk about that. I think those are elected offices. That's a little bit different. Lifetime appointments—I do think are actually necessary.

Two. Keeps some sort of checks and balances on what's happening in this world.

Now, sometimes that does favor one side over the other, but as we know, President Trump has been none too thrilled with some of his picks because Supreme Court justices don't seem to care. As I think that's okay, with necessarily who decided they were going to be in office. They are going to vote with what they think upholds the Constitution, and you may disagree with them on that. But again, you're not picking somebody to always vote your way. That's right.

And once again, it's not like the Constitution is necessarily silent on the term length. Obviously, they could add to it, but it says that federal judges hold their offices during good behavior.

So it's not just Supreme Court justices, but but as well. In the inference from that is if they're you know they could lose that through holding the process if they're you know not. Performing, the justice themselves are criminals, right? They can be removed from that scene, but it is not because of age. Or term that that is where we get the the actual lifetime appointment philosophy is from the Constitution.

It's not something that was made up later and just applied to judges.

So I think even in that, the the questions that are are are bubbling up around this as they continue to push this. Is something that you'd think people may want to think about the the depth that it would have to go. And just Salido talked about you the vultures swirling around him and how that's not necessarily a pleasant thing to wake up to in the morning. But he did discuss this directly when asked. Do you have you thought about it?

Let's hear bite thirteen.

Something I think that.

Somebody at my age has to think about every term, but I thought that I could still make a valuable contribution, which is why I became a justice and a judge in the first place. Positions that you took years ago are now the law today. Did that factor into your decision on retirement? Your influence. It's hard to give up the opportunity to.

Do something that will, I think, will be good for the Constitution and good for the country. As long as I'm, I'm able to do it. Yeah, I mean that's a pretty clear answer. As long as he's able to do it, he thinks it's good for the Constitution and good for the country. Putting aside CBS, I don't know what was going on with those camera angles.

I have to say that was a very odd editorial decision to have your host on like a nice wide shot and then the most extreme close-up of of a Supreme Court justice. You know that there's always Logan. You're starting to criticize the editorial decisions of CBS News. Makes me think that maybe the chat when they call you a liberal are are right about something. I'm more talking about the editorial team.

Whoever made that, I think that that's a odd decision. I mean, editing editorial. Not like, like news editorial. Yeah, I think that camera angles are made with intention. Uh huh.

And putting a host in a nice clean shot, and then to make an extreme close up to try to show the sweat beads coming down a Supreme Court justice. And is how old is he? I believe he's seventy four. Seventy four? I believe so.

Not that old. Chuck Schumer gonna be mad at that. It's a nice young, spry man. Seventy-six.

Sorry, seventy-six. A little bit older than Chuck. Gotta correct myself there. A year older. All right.

Phone lines are open for you. Rick Cornell's gonna be joining us in the next segment, and I want to hear from you as well, though. One eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. If you want to be on with Rick, you can call too, and then we'll get to your calls and comments to wrap up the show here towards the end. We'll be right back.

Welcome back to Secular. We will be taking your calls and comments in the next segment.

So go ahead and get online one eight hundred six eight four three one one zero. We started talking about the Supreme Court of the United States. We're going to move this topic a little bit. As we saw also over the weekend, U.S. Air Force bombers in the U.K.

returned to their home bases, the United States, following another suspected terror plot. We know this has been a kind of ongoing issue that has happened in the. U.K., but Rick Grinnell is joining us right now. But we'll maybe get a little bit more into the details here. About a dozen bombers that needed to be removed.

Right, this is where the B one bombers were stationed that were assisting in the operations against Iran. We saw the the scare that that happened last week with the the truck that had individuals that were being investigated for terrorism in the middle of the night headed towards the airbase. Fortunately, nothing took place. There was no terror attack. That was able to be accomplished by the suspected terrorist, but it clearly sent a message to the U.S.

military. And I think Rick, having you on, you start to look at the diplomatic angle of this as well. The fact that the United States did not feel that they could securely keep our bombers at one of our very close allies' military bases in their home country. Look, I think this is a win for our intelligence community and for the fact that our national security team is really watching these issues in great detail. We're going to respond as quickly as as we can.

This is, I think, the hallmark of President Trump: is that he's watching in real time. He adjusts the policy constantly.

Sometimes the reporters, you know, are reporting on a different policy from week to week, and that's because the President. Is seamlessly going through and using military action as well as diplomacy.

Now, what I know personally from President Trump is that he wants diplomacy to work, but he's not going to be convinced to do it just through words. And so, when we see individual situations that threaten our national security, our team is going to respond, and that is because President Trump is watching. Constantly and evaluating and changing the policy.

So in this particular situation, if if we're in a Situation where our hardware, our military hardware, is being risked because we find intelligence that suggests something might happen that we have to respond quickly, and and that means sometimes our allies are not responding as quickly as we want to, and we have to take matters into our own hands.

Well, I think this is the perfect case example of that, where you know that there were career State Department. Officials that were probably pulling their hair out over this, like what you are going to remove these bombers? It's going to embarrass the Brits, you know, that they can't keep our individuals safe on their own soil. But I think, and with previous administrations, not just Democrat but probably Republican as well, those voices a lot of times were the loudest in the room that could have continued to put our troops maybe in danger because of the diplomatic crises it may have. Taken place at Foggy Bottom, but you are willing to see that the President is willing to do, and as well the leadership at the Pentagon and the Secretary of War to do what is correct to keep Americans safe, rather than to protect the feelings of the the Brits.

Yeah. Look, well, you know, I've worked at the State Department for close to 13 years, and I love the State Department, and I love the passion that a lot of the individuals bring. And I think this works exactly the way it's supposed to. We've talked about this before. I believe that the President of the United States and his national security team need to have a very strong person running the Pentagon, who literally says we're not going to negotiate.

We're going to protect America, and we're going to act. Quickly to protect America, and on the other hand, in that same room should be America's top diplomat, who says, "Look, give me more time. Let me work on this. Let me see if I can get, in this particular case, the Brits to move and and do something that helps us." And so those conversations go on. The embassies may be contacted, but eventually, at some point, when you're presenting this to these two sets of information.

And it's bubbling up. There needs to be someone over the top, which is the national security team. And in our case, luckily, it's the President of the United States who's watching on a daily basis. He will say, "This is taking too long. I got to act." This is the art of the deal, and this is what President Trump thrives at.

And so, I don't necessarily think it's a total failure. I think that that sometimes it just needs to move a lot faster to protect Americans, and that's luckily why we have President Trump there to act fast. Yeah, a total failure, Rick, would be more associated with something like what happened in the withdrawal from Afghanistan, where you then eventually did not take that threat seriously, and you had. Blood on the hands of the American President. Blood on the hands of what was happening here, and thankfully these terror attacks were thwarted.

But if it's going to be risking American lives, it seems like the direction is only really one way we could go with this. Yeah. Look, as director of national intelligence, I think I heard our team say a million times that we have to act to make sure that something is secure. And many times, the public will never thank us. They don't know it is one of those things that we have to do.

What I do get frustrated is is the beat reporters covering national security. The reporters in Washington D.C. should be sophisticated enough to highlight these moments. And yet they're not. They they only react, you know, when there's an attack, and usually they're attacking the Republicans, no matter what the Republican policy is.

Rick, I do want to shift a little bit here, and because today early voting begins in your home state of California, therefore it is election day. Just about every day until November, right? Until the general election ends on November third, as the way we do things now. We were talking earlier about Justice Alito giving interviews over the weekend for his book, but talking about even that. What concerns him is that not just the threats and threats of violence that they have seen, but also the threats against the court of wanting to remake it.

He sees that as an intimidation tactic. And as we're here now in the election month that we have before us, we know that it's not just the the issues that are top level. But it's deeply constitutional issues that are on the ballot as well.

So I just wanted to get your take on that.

Now that you are officially in election season. Yeah, look, we we've got a lot of those ballot initiatives that that cut to the heart of exactly what Justice Alito is talking about on the ballot this November. I've been pushing out because we have so many in California. You know, we do we do govern by ballot initiatives so much of the time, and so I've put out a list of how to vote yes or no. I hope if you're in California voting in California that you'll check out that list.

But I have to say, Will, since you brought it up. I've been struggling this week, and I'd love to see if our viewers could help me figure this out. And I'd love your opinion. Yeah. I don't know what to do about Karen Bass and Nithya Ramen.

Who do you vote for? And a lot of people are coming to me saying, "What are we doing? Let's be collective. Let's work together as conservatives and figure out what to do." But the reality is, is I struggle because I don't want to vote for Karen Bass because she doesn't deserve reelection, and somehow I feel like it's a reward for her if she's elected, and it somehow says that everything that she did before. Is okay.

And I certainly can't vote for Nithya Raman because she's a communist. Because of everything, Rick. And so the lesser of two evils has got us trapped in Southern California.

So many people don't know what to do. I'd love to hear from the listeners as to what we should do because one of them is going to be the mayor, regardless of if we do a write-in or whatever. One of them is going to be mayor. What do we do, Rick? I don't want to try to intimidate you or or try to influence.

Influence your vote, but I think you need to vote your conscience here. But here's one way to look at it: either you can vote for someone who, when trying to fix a pothole, puts up a no parking sign, or you can vote for someone who effectively got eight stripes painted across a broken road to create a tripping hazard crosswalk.

So those are your two. One actually got something done; those stripes were painted, but the other. Little little novel approach. Let's put up a no parking sign.

So, you go. You vote your heart, Rick. But I hope that helped.

Well, it doesn't help a bit. Yeah, the Boulevard of Broken Dreams. Will there you go? You know, Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine got in a lot of hot water this week because he said I didn't vote for Harris because he couldn't because of he because his thoughts were because of Gaza. But I'm like, you know, he got ripped apart by the left.

Logan, you love you love California, Logan. What would you do? Oh, that is very tough. That is. I'm not.

I don't. I don't endorse candidates here on this show.

So I think I can. I can legally opt out of this conversation. But because I have to, right? Will yeah. You you text me and you tell me.

Sure.

Okay. All right. All right. You know, I I really don't know. That is a really tough situation to be in because you don't want to encourage people to not get out and vote and do what they need to do.

But there's a lot of other important things on the ballot as well. Sure.

I mean, look, this is the struggle. You have to vote, and and I'm actually telling my friends one of them is going to win. Yeah, and and to be honest, I I have struggled. I thought about calling one of them and saying, if I you know hold my nose and endorse you, and we bring in a bunch of conservative voters to help you win because it's neck and neck. It really is.

Yeah. What could we get out of it? That's true. That's a good idea.

Well, maybe keep us updated on that, Rick. You got about a month to figure this out. But again, early voting starts right now, and we know that California is great with early voting, mail-in voting, all the different things to see here. No problems. Never any issues.

Never, never overnight dumps of ballots. Nothing ever happens. Rick, thanks for joining us. Hey, phone lines are open. I want you to call in.

We got a lot of lines open right now. I'll be honest with you; a lot of people watching, but a lot of lines open. One eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. Call. Be a part of the show right now.

Last chance to get on the air today. But I want to hear from you. We'll be right back. Hey, phone lines are open for you. I don't know why, guys.

I'll be honest with you. A lot of you are watching right now. I can tell when you're watching. Monitor the numbers, but a lot of your comments.

So phone lines are open at one eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. But will I know we could break down some more because we actually have a lot more to chat about. That's right.

I wanted to bring this up as well because this was when the justice Justice Alito was asked about the leak that happened with the Dobbs decision. Remember, this was the opinion of Justice Alito. This was what overturned Roe versus Wade, and we had that that moment. Then that unprecedented leak. That so much so when Politico first reported it.

You almost didn't believe it was real. Many of us were like, "There's, there's no way that the actual opinion leaked. They're, they're getting duped, or, or this is something else." But no, indeed, it was a draft opinion that tracked very, very closely with the final opinion that came out. And so this is where Shannon Bream is asking Justice Alito about that leak that happened when his draft opinion was released from someone that either worked for or was on the court. Let's hear bite seven.

That was totally unprecedented in the history of the country. It was a grave breach of the trust that everybody who worked in this building had before that point. Do you have an opinion about who you think the leaker was? I do have an opinion, but the evidence. Available at this time is not strong enough for the court or for me to say this is the person who was responsible.

But it seems like the man knows. It does, doesn't it? I mean, he says he has an opinion, but he's also not going to run out and attack an individual or a person where he says that the evidence is not strong enough for him or the sounds like a judge person, right? But you know, you add more and pack the court because he, his integrity is too strong. There, that's what it sounds like to me.

Yeah, I mean, again, this was obviously all tied to why did it get leaked? It leaked because this was a decision that was going to be, and he even said he knew was going to be one of the more controversial decisions that was going to happen. He knew that people were going to have a lot of thoughts and opinions on the right to life and everything that would come out of that entire Dobbs decision. Of course, over. Returning Roe v.

Wade, but you really look at it in the grand scheme of the United States of America, was only the law of the land for what fifty years, not even not even quite.

So it wasn't as if this was something that was written in stone and they could look back on it.

Now, what you have to remember now, though, is because we often think of the Supreme Court United States as being that deciding factor that changes everything, and it is locked in forever. It took decades. Did I think it would happen in my lifetime? I didn't. I was shocked, but it just so happened to be the plan where you would have Roe versus Wade overturned.

Now, what that also means is if there is a scenario where a court is packed, or a scenario where you have more liberal justices and the conservative justices, of course, that can be rewritten. Of course, it takes many many years to get up to Supreme Court United States at this level. That doesn't mean it can't happen, and it doesn't mean that can't happen for any of the laws when we're talking. About Democrat socialist candidates coming in right now. All of this could be unwritten in our lifetime, right?

And I think that goes back to even the original point of the the broadcast and the things that we talked about. Is that the the pressure and the intimidation factor that is part of the point of releasing that leaked document? Yeah, because that's where you started to hear more vocal voices. You started to hear and see assassination attempts, and we should play this as well. This is talking about.

That the decision, as well as the leak, again, this is Justice Alito bite two. I anticipated that it would anger a great many people who believed and continue to believe strongly that there should be a constitutional right to abortion.

So I understood that I wasn't surprised that there was such a reaction. I didn't anticipate the particulars, what that would, the the forms that that reaction would take, the most extreme forms, and I never dreamed. That the draft of the opinion would be leaked—that's that was totally unprecedented in the history of the country. It was a grave breach of the trust that everybody who worked in this building had before that point, and it very predictably made the five of us in the majority targets for assassination, and nearly resulted in the assassination of my. Colleague Brett Kavanaugh.

I think when you talk about the secretive nature of the court and the things that we talked about, there there is something that, and I'm not talking about being able to live stream the video, but the way the deliberations happen, there has been so much as he calls it trust and camaraderie among justices throughout history, where they they understand the rules, and even in where they disagree, they and the people that work for them understand the sacred. ness of the job that they do as being at the top of a branch of government, a co-equal branch of government that is calling balls and strikes as judges, as they say, but but here that you you can tell how how palpable it is for him, how much it hurt in a way beyond the. This is terrible for the institution, but even that someone betrayed the trust of the justices, knowing what they were doing and knowing the principles of the court, that someone took that into their own hands and stole court documents effectively and released them to the public, to the press, to try and intimidate other other justices. Yeah, and let's hear. This is from Amy Coney Barrett, just from a few months ago, also talking about this and talking about the what happened to even her family.

And her children, and and the real risks that come into this that maybe she wasn't even anticipating. This is again just back from July, bite fifteen. They have required me to my children to think about and see things that children should not have to see or think about. One example is when threats to my life were particularly intense a few years ago, around the time of the Dobbs leak, my security detail sent me home with a bulletproof vest, and I carried it into my house, put it into my bedroom, dropped it down on a table, turned around, and my 12 year old son was standing in the doorway of my bedroom, and he wanted to know what it was. And why I had it, and I didn't know how to respond because maybe I lack imagination.

But I didn't expect that performing this service was going to put me in the position of explaining to my children what a bulletproof vest was and why I had to wear one. Unfortunately, it is the risk that not only Supreme Court justices, but anyone in the public eye, especially those who are willing to take their opinions loudly and say what they want to say, are going to end up with. And we've seen it firsthand, and we all have knowledge of what's going on in the world. And we've seen it against President Trump. We've seen it against Supreme Court justices.

We've seen it in our own lives. Unfortunately, we live in a really, really broken world right now.

So, you know what I'm going to ask you to do is just pray for these Supreme Court justices. By the way, on both sides—the conservative ones, the liberal ones, the ones in between—this shouldn't be what they have to live through right now. If you do want them to be more open and honest, and have these go on the press and and and take questions or. Do a tour or or discuss more how the the sausage is made. As they said, you know what we have to be able to protect them as well.

So pray for them and their safety and the safety of all of our elected officials and our appointed officials and everyone. And with that, though, we are going to wrap up today's show. I appreciate everyone who listened. Look, eleven Supreme the Supreme Court starts today. The ACLU team's got eleven.

Cases pending right now. I got the whole list in front of me. I could read them off to you, but look, we'll let's get into that another day because so many of these are very nuanced, very detailed. But the ACLJ team, always hard at work. You're not already a monthly supporter.

This is why it's important to have ACLJ champions, those that give continually, regularly, on an ongoing monthly basis. I'm gonna ask you to do that today if you can support the work. We know times are tough financially, so if you can't, I totally understand. There's great free ways you can get involved. That's at aclj.org.

You can share. Of course, you can post all those things. None of our content, and none of our legal work, by the way, no charge ever goes to a client. All of that is because people like you support the work financially.

So do it today at aclj.org, so we can be there for you if you need us. Of course, we're there for people around the country and around the world. Talk to you tomorrow.